I don’t shop for shoes, I rarely shop for clothes, but I love shopping for my house. I’ve always been quite focused on one day having my dream home and Turkey is where I’ll come when I win the lottery. The shops here are like Aladdin’s Cave. Everything glows, sparkles or looks soft and touchable. It’s all in either bright, rainbow colours, like the lamps or deep earthy reds and browns, like the carpets. God, just writing about it makes me want to grab my credit cards and get out there.
Not only that but it’s so *easy*. You like this lamp? Sure it looks huge but we’ll ship it for you! DHL! FedEx! Straight to your door! The more you buy, the cheaper it gets… come on lady, this would look great in your house! Now have some apple tea, sit down and we’ll show you everything we have.
The last few days of our tour have involved trips to bazaars, lamp shops, carpet factories, pottery warehouses with beautiful plates… it is a soul wrenching experience for me to say no to something that I think would add to the vision I have for my place.
Carpets galore!
Some things are easier to say no to than others – like the 20,000 euro rugs that we watched being hand woven (some had over 1000 silk knots per square centimetre).
Look at that detail!
Bug to rug!
Apart from my few trinkets I think the main thing I’ll be adding to my lifestyle once I get home is Turkish tea. I’ve never really enjoyed tea and only briefly drank coffee but Turkish tea is right up my alley. Tiny little glasses of what is essentially hot apple juice but made from a powder. This is something I could get on board with.
Apart from breaking all kinds of biblical laws about coveting Turkish people’s handicrafts, we took it somewhat easy on our last day in Cappadocia. I’d show you photos of that but I’m pretty sure you can imagine what 3 people surfing the net for 8 hours looks like. So instead here’s a crappy photo of our hotel, taken form a bus rather than, say, me getting out on foot and taking a decent one from the road.
Don’t worry, with years of practice you too can take photos this awesome. Never forget – a light post adds to ambiance. Our room was in that cone of rock.
Here’s a bunch of loosely-related photos that I want to show you from our three nights in Cappadocia.
Alien landscape.
So many cats in Turkey.
All the epic views!
On a 30+ day I want to sit at a table in a stream.
Our tour guide looked like our friend Leah and had the same beautiful smile and bouncy attitude.
Evil eye tree!
Here Comes The Planet 
Amanda and Luke, Absolutely gorgeous photos – I especially love the Evil Eye Tree. You should enter the Capture the Colour photo contest because that photo would be a standout in the Blue Category. Here’s the link. ~Terri
http://www.travelsupermarket.com/c/holidays/capture-the-colour/
Thank you! I’m thinking I shall definitely enter. My first thought for yellow is cheetahs in yellow grass. Have to think on the other colours!
I love the evil eye tree! So very hard not to “want” things when you’re surrounded by such gorgeous colors and textures, but at the other end of life we are busy ( unsuccessfully ) to pare back ” things” and just keep memories. Just hope the memory bank will keep it all safe and let me roam around in there whenever I choose to go there !
It’s such a hard task, getting rid of things. I find I can spend a whole day just going through one box of memorabilia. Some people advocate taking photos of things before chucking them. My style is more ‘pack it under the house and deal with it another day’ 😉
Light post add to ambience. Haha!
There’s definitely something to be said for allowing a bit of out-of-focus curtain to frame the shot too. I’m basically the Ansel Adams of Turkey ;-).
Now the Turkish rugs wouldn’t get me there, they all look the same to me…. However… that table in that stream? I’m there!
How idyllic does it look? Everywhere we’ve been in Turkey so far makes me think I could easily spend twice as long here.
Apple tea sounds amazing, I will have to try it
It pretty much tastes just like hot apple juice but is made from powder.. all very mysterious to non-drinking-tea-me!
I got addicted to that apple ‘tea’. I did eventually find it in Melbourne, in a random shop on Sydney Road. I didn’t so much like the real (black) Turkish tea though. And the coffee – amazing!!
I’ve been mixing boiling water with apple juice since I was 5! Actually possibly younger and I should credit mum with starting it. Turkey has so been added to my travel list! River table ftw! Lol @ bus photo, that’s as good as one of mine!! 😉 x