Our destination is Sapanca, but we take a detour.
Shell has anthropology running through her viens. History and the way we lived in the past is her passion. She has discovered an archelogical site nearby and head for a visit.
I love these detours, but what I love most is how much Shell appreciates them. Shell is an incredible teacher, and an even more amazing leader, but this is surely her calling.
I am short on details, I was watching Shell explore the caves.
Home of the Phrygians, the village is dug out of the stone cliffs a lazy 2000 years ago.
We head north and climb into the mountains.
Sapanca is a tourist town that sits on lake Gölü.
We drive up the steep cliffs that surround the town. Holiday apartments are being built everywhere, it would seem Sapanca is a town on the move. It is steep, windy roads only wide enough for one car. We are fortunate to only encounter two cement trucks on the way up.
We are greeted by our host and are shown to our tree house. It is a steep walk of a few hundred meters.
Worth it. A bed on a mezzanine with views out to the lake. A kitchenette, a deck with a spa and almost enough hot water to quarter fill it.
We skipped lunch, Shell has found a highly rated place in the town centre. We brave the steep drive down to the lake.
The food is local, and absolutely delicious. Eker Lokantasi has every dish imaginable. At the front of the restaurant are huge, almost white pumpkins. I could not find out what they are called, but they make the most impressive dessert.
I have no idea what witchcraft is in use, I am certain there is monumental amounts of sugar, the flesh holds together and is served with clotted cream an some kind of nut sauce. Delicious, and healthy as it is a vegetable.
We search high and low for some wine to take home. To be honest, the search would have ended quickly if I was not such a wine snob and grabbed a bottle from the supermarket. Instead, we drove around looking for a bottleshop, found one, and it was terrible.
We climb back up the steep hillside and fall asleep with the sun. A long day. The matress is hard but it is absolute silence and the cabin is cool.
I can feel myself getting sick.
We wake up the next morning and book a second night.
I cook breakfast, eggs and tomatoes.
We lay around doing nothing for half the day and it is perfect.
The prospect of sweet pumpkin and clotted cream was too much and we ventured into town. If I am getting sick and drinking, I will need to care for my health. Vegetables are key, pumpkin etc.
I would not describe Sapanca as beautiful. It isn’t exactly bland, perhaps somewhere between homely and uninviting. But the pumpkin is marvelous.
“They lived in ugly places where there were only ugly things to do. They didn’t own doodley-squat, so they couldn’t improve their surroundings. So they did their best to make their insides beautiful instead.”
Kurt Vonnegut
We head home for wine. I have an undiscovered talent, opening wine without a corkscrew.
The first wine is undrinkable, the second is worse. Should have stuck with the supermarket. Both down the sink.
“Drinking is an emotional thing. It joggles you out of the standardism of everyday life, out of everything being the same.”
Charles Bukowski
Discover more from now please now
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.