To Turkey

To go from Aleppo to Antakya by bus, you have to leave at 5:00 AM. Aside from the general pain of hauling ourselves out of bed, the border crossing was easy and uneventful. At one point I caused panic at the Syrian border because, for want of another pen, I filled out my exit card in red ink. I was hauled to a distant office and back before everyone agreed to implement the solution I suggested to begin with and trace over the red ink with a more acceptable color. Turkish visas are $20 at the border and take no time at all. Before long we were in Antakya.

Antakya used to be Antioch, one of the most important Christian cities in the world, but now it is pretty much just a modern town. Dan and I decided to buy an onward ticket to Kaysari (from which we planned to head to Göreme) for the afternoon, leave our bags with the ticket office, and explore for a bit. Antakya's most awesome attraction for ancient history buffs is definitely the museum, which displayed some of the best mosaics I have ever seen. Seriously, I have seen a million mosaics this trip but never anything like the ones at this museum. The people even had individualized facial features!



I also loved how much sea life was depicted in various pieces. This squid made me wonder if Cthulu was something more than an H.P. Lovecraft invention:



After a quick lunch at "Mydonos," clearly a McDonald's ripoff, we hiked to a mountain and visited the Church of St. Peter, a cave that allegedly belonged to St. Luke and was one of the earliest Christian hideouts. There was an extra tunnel that was said to be an escape route for disturbed worshippers on the run from secret meetings. I am unconvinced—that church was way overrated, and had a huge admission fee given that it was basically just one single cave room with a modern altar and 1930s statue of St. Peter. The good news, I guess, is that the Pope announced a "plenary indulgence" for all who make pilgrimages to this particular cave church. Perhaps the grace of the Catholic Church can extend even to me!



We spent hours and hours on a bus to Kaysari (ancient Caesarea, home to some of Christianity's greatest intellectuals, though again you couldn't tell that now). Unfortunately, it was around 11:30 PM and there were no more buses to Göreme until 7:00 AM. Like many other weary travelers, we claimed a bench and napped until morning. It was pretty unpleasant, but the station was safe and clean. When we got to Göreme, we chose from one of the many identical cave hotels available to tourists—yes, they have cave rooms that are cut into the rocks. We selected the Ufuk hotel and have been very happy with it. I was pretty wiped out by the time we got there and set our bags down, but we went out for a full day anyway.