Its 5 am . “The danger is when you are coming down , If it crashes or drags then press your backs to the basket and put your cameras away” said the balloon instructor , and with that we were off . In the next ten minutes I am ten thousand feet above the earth, looking down from a hot air balloon on the lunar landscape of Cappadoccia.

Cappadoccia is a long way from Delhi. First to Istanbul, and then an hour’s plane from here took me to kayseri in southwest Anatolia, from here another hour by taxi and I was in the small town of Goreme at the heart of Cappadoccia.
I had my plan for the next two days chalked out: Take a historical tour of the region, visit the underground cities; and fly in a balloon

The best way of exploring the history and the volcanic landscape of the region in a short time is to take an adventure tour . For 6o liras, and a day in a van you can travel the whole of Cappadoccia.

The tour starts at a vantage spot just outside the city called the Goreme panorama. From here you get an uninterrupted view of rocks called fairy chimneys for which Cappadoccia is famous. My guide explained the origin of their names and the peculiar shape.

Cappadoccia she said is in the middle of what was once a volcanic region. Over time various minerals had been laid down . The top was basalt, a hard mineral, and the base tufa, a relatively soft mineral. Then the wind . ice and rain had a good time in the valleys and the tufa started eroding faster than the basalt. The result was the hundreds of phallic structures below us called fairy chimneys, so named because locals thought that in the moonlight they could see magical beings in them.

Our next stop was at Kaymakli an underground city that had been dug out by the Hittites when they ruled the region in 1800 BC. The city is eight stories deep Inside there are rooms, stables, and living areas . Whenever they were threatened by war the Hittites would dive into these subterranean chambers , with their horses , and hole up for months on end. For a moment I wondered how they survived so long without ventilation or food , until I looked to a corner and saw shafts , storage areas and kitchens all connected by a maze of passageways and tunnels. It was through one of them that I was now walking. It is cold and the tunnels are so narrow that after twenty minutes of walking like a duck, I look forward to the exit. A tight turn , a squeeze through a narrow stairwell and we were back in the sunshine ready for the next stop.

Avanos is a pottery village . It lies at the other end of the Cappadoccia away from Kaymakli. A potter’s workshop – cum- showroom is the highlight of the trip to this village. We were taken around the workshop by the master potter; In the first room he showed us how the clay was prepared, and over a cup of apple tea , he demonstrated how it was shaped . In the next room the artists were working from catalogues and sketching intricate designs onto the plates , bowls and vases. Then he led us to a showroom

Everything here is tempting. Brilliantly painted bowls, tiles with intricate patterns in Mavi(blue) , and ashtrays so delicately crafted you don’t feel like using them . I lifted a tile and looked at the price. 140 dollars.

Our last stop that day was actually a walk , We slid and slipped our way to the bottom of one of the canyons called Rose valley. For the next hour I walked through a footpath, flanked by rocky cliffs and thick vegetation. Every so often I looked up to see tiny dove -cotes cut high into the rock face. Pigeon houses said my guide. These dove-cotes had apparently been carved by the ottoman rulers for the pigeons to roost and crap in comfort (or as our guide put it leave their nitrogen rich deposits behind) . Then they ottomans would get onto their ladders and collect the droppings , which they turned into fertilizer for their farms.

By the time we ended the walk, and arrived at the small village of Cavusin the sun was setting ,turning the rocks into a dazzle of pink and red

I had just enough time for a wander through the city centre of Goreme and dinner. The small city centre of Goreme is a square with a few wooden benches flanked by ‘Cay’ shops. Here old Turkish men with wrinkled pink skins, sit and play backgammon and sip cay through the day. Walk past them to a bend in the road and Goreme suddenly looks touristy: Souvenir shops, ‘Rent- an- ATV- bike places’, and a series of restaurants . On the previous evening I had seen a restaurant with a pile of clay pots in front. Intrigued, I headed straight for this place and pointed to the clay pot in the menu.
Sebzeli Guvek is a Turkish stew, made up of a tomato sauce seasoned with spices and cooked with eggplants, green beans , potatoes and peppers , carrots along with Turkish spices. It is cooked in a clay pot and the waiter makes a show as he brings it to the table and carefully cracks the top open , leaving you to succumb to the aroma of spices and warm pilaf.

Eaten with an order of Cacik (a yoghurt dip with grated cucumber, olive oil and garlic) it is an ideal sampling of a traditional Vegetarian Turkish food.
When I finished he brought me a ‘Kocuk cay” (Small tea served in an hour shaped glass) and a business card. ‘Special price on the balloon ride, only 120 euros , my brother owns this company.”

We were woken up at 4 am that day. Half an hour later I was standing ,inside the basket of a balloon in a large field outside Goreme. Mustafa our flight instructor was giving us safety instructions and preparing the balloon for take off . He then turned on the helium cylinders in the centre. First the one and then the other. There was a loud noise , almost like a hundred welding torches had gone off at once, and we began to rise gently. Five minutes later we were drifting gently at ten thousand feet .In the basket , the cameras were clicking furiously; for from here the view is stunning; Mile upon mile of canyons , valleys dotted with olive farms and a horizon filled with balloons of different colors , all going up like giant lollipops into the sky .

Every now and then Mustafa would point to a feature in the landscape and promptly turn off the cylinders. We glided into the valleys, now kissing a rock face, now squeezing between two fairy chimneys and now tossing a visiting card over the side to an eager photographer. Then he would fire the cylinders again and we would be back again at ten thousand feet , clicking excitedly at the scenes below. When it finally ended one hour later, Mustafa reminded us about our safety precautions.

If we crash – well I may not have lived to write this piece or tell you that if you wish to look at the earth from a basket ten thousand feet in the sky, cappadocicia is a good place to go.