Cave Hotel in Nar, Nevşehir Merkez, Nevşehir, Cappadocia, Türkiye – Staying Inside Cappadocia’s Rock-Cut Landscape

Nevşehir Cave Hotel

We woke inside a rock.

After the long run down from Ankara, we had checked into Ennar Cave House in Nevşehir and gone to sleep inside the rock. Morning made the change of landscape impossible to ignore. This chapter continues directly from Turkey Silk Road Overland Part 1, where the road carried us across Thrace, Istanbul, Bursa, the Phrygian Valley, and Ankara before setting us down in Cappadocia for the next phase.

It sounds dramatic, but in Cappadocia, walls are merely suggestions. Western and central Anatolia had been state buildings, bazaars, caravan routes, and broad avenues. This was something else entirely. The valleys looked carved rather than built. Towers of stone stood around like eroded chess pieces. It felt less like reaching another city and more like waking up inside a geology problem that people had solved by turning it into architecture.

Cave Hotel Room in Nar, Nevşehir Merkez, Nevşehir, Cappadocia, Türkiye – Staying Inside Cappadocia’s Rock-Cut Landscape

The soft volcanic tuff makes ordinary construction look unimaginative. People simply hollowed out the slopes. We spent our first morning navigating the ridges of Uçhisar. The town revolves around a massive, Swiss-cheese rock outcrop that historically served as a natural fortress. When your local geology hands you a sixty-meter-high stone tower, you carve windows into it, call it a castle, and wait out the invasions. After calculating the stairs involved, we gave in to a more elevated temptation.

Nevşehir, Cappadocia, Türkiye – Rock-Cut Homes, Castle Hill, and the Ancient Volcanic Landscape of Central Anatolia

Uçhisar and the Balloon Ride

We went up in a hot air balloon. From the basket, Cappadocia stopped looking strange and started making tactical sense. Valleys became transport corridors. Ridges became defensive walls. Settlements lined up into a coherent grid.

Cappadocia Hot Air Balloon Ride at Sunrise, Türkiye – Floating Above Fairy Chimneys, Valleys, and the Volcanic Landscape of Central Anatolia

From the ground, the fairy chimneys are theatrical. From above, they are entirely practical. The landscape was exceptional at hiding people, protecting them, and giving them workable terrain in a rough neighborhood.

The local economy still relies heavily on the ground beneath it. In nearby Avanos, locals have been pulling red clay from the Kızılırmak River to throw pottery since the Hittite era. That is an aggressively long time to hold onto a job description. The culinary byproduct of this is testi kebabı. Meat and vegetables are sealed inside a clay pot, cooked in fire, and violently cracked open at your table. It is equal parts dinner and controlled demolition.

Derinkuyu Underground City

By evening, we went underground. Above ground, the region is surreal. Below ground, it is sternly functional.

Derinkuyu Underground City, Cappadocia, Türkiye – At the Entrance to One of the Deepest Ancient Underground Cities in the World

Derinkuyu is an 85-meter-deep survival bunker. The 9th-century residents carved out 18 levels of stables, chapels, and kitchens to avoid the neighbors. Raids and religious persecution ruin the mood upstairs. The soft volcanic stone made subterranean living possible. Paranoia made it necessary. It held roughly 20,000 people and a panicked menagerie of livestock.

A passage leading into a large hall deep inside Derinkuyu underground city

The 55-meter ventilation shaft doubled as a well. Some well mouths stopped intentionally short of the surface so invading armies could not poison the water supply. They prioritized air, grain storage, and heavy rolling stone doors over luxury plumbing. We slept back in our cave hotel, appreciating the comparative lack of sieges.

Sultan Han Caravanserai

We pointed the car west the next morning. The ancient Silk Road caravanserai belt demanded attention. Sultan Han, west of Aksaray, does not bother with modesty.

Sultanhanı, Aksaray, Türkiye – At the Historic Silk Road Town Beside the 13th-Century Sultan Han Caravanserai

Built in 1229 under Seljuk Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I, it is a freight fortress. In the 13th century, this was the backbone of a sprawling economic engine. Spices, textiles, and heavily embellished rumors moved across Anatolia on the backs of tired camels. Sultan Han offered these merchants three days of free shelter. Enter through the marble portal, and the scale makes its point immediately.

Sultan Han Caravanserai, Aksaray, Türkiye – Inside the 13th-Century Seljuk Silk Road Caravanserai Built in 1229 and Enlarged in 1278 for Traders, Camels, and Commerce Across Anatolia. In the middle of Sultan Han’s freight yard stands its raised kiosk mosque. Even on the hard commercial roads of the Seljuk Silk Road, prayer was built right into the architecture of movement.

The open courtyard handled summer traffic. The enclosed hall managed winter. A raised kiosk mosque sits dead center in the yard. Religion and logistics occupied the exact same real estate. Blacksmiths, cobblers, and cooks operated inside the walls. The road outside was suspicious and inconvenient. Inside, the Seljuks offered strict management.

Interior of Sultan Han Caravanserai, Aksaray, Türkiye – The Monumental 13th-Century Seljuk Winter Hall on the Konya–Aksaray Silk Road, First Built in 1229 under Sultan Alaeddin Keykubad I and Enlarged in 1278 as a Secure Stone Fortress for Merchants, Animals, and Trade Across Anatolia

The Silk Road sounds romantic until you remember it was mostly bad weather, sore feet, and a pressing need for thick walls before sunset. Sultan Han solved the misery. We spent a few hours walking the perimeter before driving back to base.

Monumental Portal of Sultan Han Caravanserai, Aksaray, Türkiye – The Grand 13th-Century Seljuk Entrance with Muqarnas Vaulting, Geometric Stone Carving, Kufic Inscriptions, and Fortress-Like Silk Road Architecture

Saruhan and the Dervishes

Shehzadi at Saruhan Caravanserai, Cappadocia, Türkiye — our modern Silk Road rig parked at the gate of a 13th-century Seljuk roadside fortress built for merchants, animals, and long-distance trade

Evening took us to Saruhan Caravanserai near Avanos. Built in 1249, it follows the classic Seljuk floor plan in a slightly smaller footprint. Today, it functions as a venue for the Mevlevi Sema. We ate dinner under the stone vaulting. After a day of heavy logistics, sitting down in another waystation felt correct.

Inside Saruhan Caravanserai, Cappadocia, Türkiye — the stone courtyard where Silk Road caravans once paused for shelter, and where we later stayed for dinner and the Mevlevi Sema whirling dervishes ceremony

Saruhan still has its 13th-century Seljuk bones, but these days it works very much as a commercial heritage venue. What it sells most clearly is the evening whirling dervish / Mevlevi Sema experience, usually through tour operators pushing atmosphere, authenticity, and easy logistics. The old Silk Road stop now makes its living from modern travelers, which is tidy in its own way. The food side is less front-and-center. The ceremony is the real product; any dinner or drinks tend to sit around it rather than lead the marketing.

Saruhan now markets ritual first, hospitality second, history everywhere.

Inside a side chamber at Saruhan Caravanserai, Cappadocia, Türkiye — now dressed with Turkish lamps, kilims, and textiles, where a hard-working Silk Road stop has acquired a little color and a lot less camel smell

The whirling dervishes turned. This is not a dance. It is discipline built into movement. The Mevlevi order grew around the 13th-century mystic Jalal al-Din Rumi in Konya. Novices traditionally trained for 1,001 days. You do not casually spin in a weighted robe without intense practice.

Inside Saruhan Caravanserai, Cappadocia, Türkiye — the dark stone hall where the Mevlevi Sema is now staged for visitors, turning a former Silk Road caravan stop into one of Cappadocia’s best-known ritual performance venues

Every gesture is loaded. The tall felt hat is the tombstone of the ego. The white robe is a burial shroud. They turn on the left foot, driven by the right, with one palm facing up to receive and one facing down to give. The mutrip ensemble anchors the room with a reed flute and kettle drums. It is a quiet reminder that on a road built for transit, some motion is about staying perfectly centered.

We drove back to our cave and slept for one last night inside the rock.

Aybastı Perşembe Yaylası via Tokat

We checked out the next morning and aimed north. The route ran through Tokat, a quiet transit through the deep Anatolian interior. We left the dry dust behind and climbed into the Canik Mountains toward Aybastı Perşembe Yaylası in Ordu Province.

At Aybastı Perşembe Yaylası, Ordu, Türkiye — Shehzadi parked above the high meadows and little lake of one of northern Anatolia’s strangest and loveliest yayla landscapes

At 1,500 meters above sea level, the air bites. Perşembe Yaylası is famous for its menderesler—a series of tight, looping meanders cutting through vibrant green highland grass. The plateau rolls toward the horizon in heavy folds. This is a working yayla. It is a summer pastureland, not a manicured tourist overlook.

The little lake by the viewpoint, Perşembe Yaylası Göleti, caught the shifting sky. We parked for the night. The highland wind was a harsh, welcome change from the subterranean stale air of Derinkuyu. We slept with the windows cracked.

Ordu and the Black Sea Coast

We dropped out of the mountains the next morning and hit Ordu. The geography compressed. Mountains crashed directly into the Black Sea.

Ordu is the global capital of hazelnuts. The coastal economy practically runs on the shells, shifting our diet and our view immediately. We merged onto the D010 highway, pushing east through Giresun, Trabzon, Rize, Ardeşen, and Hopa. The road alternated between long dark tunnels and blinding views of the water. We had driven this exact coast westbound on an earlier trip. Coming back across it felt like resuming a conversation mid-sentence.

Eynesil, Giresun, Türkiye — one of the numerous small Black Sea coastal towns on our eastbound road to Batumi, tucked between Görele and the Trabzon side of the shore

Tea is the absolute ruler of the eastern stretch. The hills around Rize are deeply terraced with it. The first modern tea factory opened here in 1946, entirely rewriting the regional agricultural economy. Today, locals harvest the steep slopes with massive shears, and a tulip-shaped glass of black tea arrives at every stop by pure geographic reflex. Black cabbage soup and anchovies replaced central Anatolia's clay-pot kebabs. At Hopa, the Laz cultural influence bleeds through the menu. We reached the Sarp border crossing by late afternoon. Formalities reduced our grand overland narrative to stamps, indifferent guards, and a queue of idling trucks.

Turkey had thrown cave rooms, underground bunkers, Seljuk fortresses, dervishes, highland meanders, and a rainy tea coast at us in just four days. The distances were massive. The history was heavy. We let the road settle in our heads.

Back in Georgia

Back in Georgia at Sarpi — Shehzadi rolls across the Hopa-Sarpi border at sunset, leaving Türkiye behind and re-entering one of our "home" countries on the Black Sea

Crossing back into Georgia at Sarpi felt less like entering somewhere new and more like returning to a place that already knew our shape. Borders are usually all papers, stamps, windows, and the usual administrative theater, but this one came with a different mood. The light was falling over the Black Sea, the road was temporarily behind us, and Georgia was waiting. After Cappadocia’s caves, Seljuk caravanserais, whirling dervishes, upland yaylas, and the long wet Turkish coast, it was oddly comforting to roll back into Georgia and think, yes, all right, we know where the good khachapuri lives.

Batumi, Georgia arrived exactly on time. We crossed the line. The coast turned aggressively urban. Neon cut through the salt air.

Batumi, Georgia, at night — the Black Sea city glowing below our hotel balcony as the long road through Türkiye finally gives way to neon, sea air, and one more homecoming

Adjara welcomed us with carbohydrates. We ordered Ajarian khachapuri—a boat of dough filled with molten cheese, butter, and an egg. You tear the crust and dip. It is highly effective caloric recovery. Outside the restaurants, events like the Gandagana Festival survive as loud, musical reminders that old Ajarian rural culture refuses to be entirely paved over by modern casinos. We checked into our hotel and let the engine cool.

By the time we rolled back into Georgia at Sarpi, this little return felt less like a border crossing and more like the end of a very long sentence. We had started out from Tbilisi and headed west along the Black Sea into Türkiye, then on through Greece and into North Macedonia, where Skopje gave us Alexander, Mother Teresa, Matka Canyon, and the agreeable absurdity of covering multiple countries before dinner. From there, the road kept unspooling across the Adriatic world by ferry and highway: Greece into Italy, then onward to Spain, then south again across the Strait of Gibraltar into Morocco, where Tangier, Chefchaouen, Tetouan, and Ksar es-Seghir turned the journey into a proper Africa chapter. Then came the return north: back to Spain, up to Andorra, across the Pyrenees into France, on through Lyon and Chandolin in Switzerland, down to Lake Como and Venice in Italy, then east through Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and into Türkiye again. It was a ridiculous, magnificent chain of borders, ferries, mountain roads, old trade cities, and historical detours, all stitched together by Shehzadi and an unhealthy tolerance for distance.

Türkiye was the final long bridge back toward Georgia. We crossed from Bulgaria into Thrace, drove through Istanbul and over the Bosphorus, then ran the Silk Road line through Bursa, the Phrygian Valley, Ankara, and on into Cappadocia. There we slept in a cave hotel, floated over Uçhisar in a balloon, dropped into Derinkuyu, stood inside Sultan Han, and spent an evening at Saruhan with dinner and the Mevlevi Sema before pushing north through Tokat to Aybastı Perşembe Yaylası and then east along the Black Sea coast through Ordu, Giresun, Trabzon, Rize, Ardeşen, Arhavi, and Hopa. By the time we crossed back into Georgia and checked into Batumi, the road behind us reached across continents. If you want the full trail of that loop — from our Georgian departure to our Georgian return — here it is in order, one post at a time, because memory is charming but hyperlinks are more reliable.

• Georgia, Turkey, Greece into North Macedonia: Tbilisi → Batumi → Sarpi/Sarp border → Hopa → Arhavi → Rize → Samsun → Düzce → Istanbul / Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge → Ipsala → Kipi border → Alexandroupoli → Drama → Thessaloniki corridor → Evzoni/Bogorodica border → Skopje
• Skopje, North Macedonia, from Greece: northern Greece → Evzoni/Bogorodica border → Skopje and around it → back to Greece
• Greece to Spain via Italy: Igoumenitsa → ferry to Ancona → drive across Italy → Civitavecchia → ferry to Barcelona → Mar de Pulpí / Almería
• Andalucía to Tangier: Mar de Pulpí / Andalusian coast → Algeciras / Tarifa side → ferry across the Strait of Gibraltar → Tangier
• Tangier: arrival in Tangier → Medina / Kasbah / Bab Bhar / Bab Haha / Ibn Battuta Museum / American Legation / Petit Socco / Grand Socco → Perdicaris Park / Rmilat → Cape Spartel / Achakkar / Hercules Caves
• Chefchaouen: Tangier region → inland to Chefchaouen
• Tetouan, Ksar es-Seghir, back to Spain: Chefchaouen / north Morocco → Tetouan → Ksar es-Seghir → Tangier Med / Tangier side → ferry to Algeciras → Spain
• Spain to Andorra: Mar de Pulpí → across Spain toward the Pyrenees → Spain–Andorra border → Sant Julià de Lòria / Aubinyà → back toward the Spain-side Pyrenees
• Pyrenees to the Alps: camp near Spain–Andorra border → Andorra → Spain briefly → France → Fontpédrouse / Pont Séjourné area → campground near Lyon / Faramans
• Lyon to Chandolin: Lyon → Silk Museum / city stop → Switzerland → Chandolin / Valais side
• Chandolin to Venice via Lake Como: Chandolin → Simplon corridor → Lake Como → Venice / Marco Polo / Murano
• Italy, Slovenia, Croatia: Venice → Valico di Sant’Andrea border → Lake Bled → Ljubljana → Maribor → Obrežje border → Zagreb
• Zagreb, Bosnia, Belgrade: Zagreb → Hrvatska Dubica / Kozarska Dubica border → Kozarska Dubica / Donja Gradina area → Belgrade
• Belgrade to Sofia: Belgrade → Niš → Sofia
• Sofia to Türkiye: Sofia → Bulgaria interior / medieval stops → Bulgaria–Türkiye border → Turkish Thrace
• Turkey Silk Road Part 1: Thrace → Istanbul → Bosphorus → Gulf of İzmit → Bursa → Phrygian Valley → Ankara
• Turkey Silk Road Part 2: (This leg) Nevşehir cave hotel → Uçhisar / balloon ride → Derinkuyu → Sultan Han → Saruhan → Tokat corridor → Aybastı Perşembe Yaylası → Ordu → Giresun → Eynesil → Trabzon → Rize → Ardeşen → Arhavi → Hopa → Sarpi border → Batumi

Up next - exploring Georgia, then into Central Asia.

Rubber on the road!

- #VagabondCouple and Shehzadi