Cappadocia: Halfway Between Turkey and Tatooine

In the central regions of Anatolia, in the Republic of Turkey, lies the ancient and beautiful region of Cappadocia.  The heart of Cappadocia is the Göreme valley, a lunar landscape of weathered volcanic rock formations called "fairy chimneys," sometimes riddled with ancient dwellings carved directly into the volcanic tuff, bursting like mushrooms from the cracked desert floor.  Although not well-known to most travelers hailing from North America, after seeing a single picture, it takes little convincing that Cappadocia is one of the most mysterious and lovely places on Earth, and well worth exploring.

A courtyard at Cappadocia Cave Suites hotel in Göreme, Turkey

The volcanic tuff has served as a shelter and dwelling place for locals for many centuries. However, in recent years the caves are being converted into luxury hotels where each room is unique, high quality restaurants with a magical ambience, and underground spas where visitors can receive a Turkish Massage in an underground chamber built in the style of a traditional Hamam.

Have a luxurious Turkish Bath at the Kelebek Cave Hotel Hamam

The region is perhaps most famous for its hot air balloon rides, which occur at dawn almost every day of the year (weather permitting).  There are many reputable ballooning operations in Cappadocia, and dozens of balloons fly every day.  However, I recommend Butterfly Balloons because the balloon captains are hilarious storytellers, and such expert pilots that they can softly land the basket of the balloon directly on a small truck trailer from a mile up. You get to celebrate with a toast of champagne and orange juice at the end of every landing.

A view of the Zelve Valley from the basket of a Butterfly Balloon

Nearby Avanos is a center for the production of beautiful handcrafted ceramics.  Firca Ceramics is one of the main workshops, and this family business has been hand-forming and hand-painting artisanal ceramic pieces in the same cave for almost two hundred years.

Inside Firca Ceramic in Avanos, Turkey

A handful of excellent restaurants can be found in Göreme.  If you are ever in the region, don't miss out on Topdeck Cave Restaurant.  It is a completely family-run establishment in which the Father (his nickname is Topdeck) and Mother do the cooking, while their two talkative young daughters take orders and serve the meals.  It's a little difficult to find Topdeck Cave Restaurant in a back alley of Göreme and requires carefully following a small map to find it. However, the food and the table talk with the charismatic and energetic waitresses are well worth the search.

Meals at Topdeck Cave Restaurant

The portion of our Turkish honeymoon that was spent in Cappadocia was the most cherished part of our trip.  I highly recommend a visit to Göreme Valley as part of any trip to Turkey.  And although it may seem a little expensive to ride one of the hot air balloons at dawn, I promise that the experience is well worth the price!

Hot Air Ballooning at Dawn in Cappadocia

Yerkes Observatory: A Wisconsin Science Temple

Did you know the world's largest refractor telescope is located in southern Wisconsin? The Yerkes Observatory was built in 1897 in Williams Bay, on the northern shore of Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.  Although it is now past its prime for making major astronomical discoveries, today it is a really neat museum and education center.  Danielle and I visited it last year, and I thought I would record a few interesting photographs and tidbits here that might not be found on Wikipedia (where you can go and learn that the Observatory and nearby Frozen Lake Geneva were used as filming locations for Chain Reaction (1996), starring Keanu Reeves and Morgan Freeman).  They typically only provide free tours of the observatory on Saturday mornings, so you have to plan ahead a little bit if you want to visit.

The main telescope itself is quite impressive in scale, as you can see compared to the spiral staircase in this photograph.  Don't leave your jacket in the car if it is a cold morning, because the dome is kept unheated.  This is both because it would be too expensive to heat the dome, and to improve the astronomical viewing conditions by avoiding the atmospheric turbulence that would be caused by warm air escaping the open dome by convection.

Even Albert Einstein (middle right) managed to make a pilgrimage to the Yerkes Observatory in 1921.  It is obvious by comparing this photograph to the previous one that the floor is at different levels with respect to the bottom of the dome.  The entire floor in the room is actually a giant elevator.  Depending on the angle of the telescope, the viewing end changes height.  The solution that the engineers devised is to raise and lower the floor to reach the business end.  The electric motors that lift the floor elevator are still in working condition, and you can ride it up and down on the tour.

Here is a picture of one of the massive counterweights and pulleys that helps raise and lower the floor of the observatory.  There are several of these distributed around the circumference of the room.

The architectural details are fantastic and full of astronomical symbolism, some of which will be described by the tour guide.  It is pretty neat how the lobby hasn't changed very much from how it was at the end of the 19th century.

If you take a tour, make sure to keep an eye out for Spiderman hanging out in the rafters of the dome!

Favorites from the Boston Museum of Fine Arts

Two weeks ago I was in Boston, MA, for the MRS (Materials Research Society) Fall Meeting at the Hynes Convention Center.  After the conference was over I was able to spend most of the day Friday at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.  It is a lovely museum.

I took the hour-long "Art of the Ancient World" tour, and then explored the rest of the museum on my own.  One thing I learned that I did not previously know is that the Museum of Fine Arts (also known as the MFA) has one of the largest and most exquisite collections of ancient Egyptian art and artifacts in the United States.

These masterfully done paintings are from the interior of the wooden outer coffin of Djehutynakht, who was a governor during the Middle Kingdom of Egypt (2040-1640 BC).  Apparently this piece is notable for the onion bulbs in the lower middle, which have shading to indicate their roundness, and the darker coloration for Djehutynakht's left leg (seated), again indicating some depth.  This is one of the earliest examples of shadow and depth in painted art.  What is also amazing is that this is on the inside of a sealed coffin, so it wasn't really artwork meant for the living to admire.

These wooden ship models are also from the tomb of Djehutynakht.  I am always astounded that little delicate pieces of wood like this can not only survive for millennia, but they look like they could have been made yesterday.

In addition to fantastic Egyptian objects, there were many interesting Mesopotamian artifacts in the collection.  For example, here is a cylindrical carved seal from ancient Babylon:

The cylinder seal is on the left, and an example of its impression in plaster is on the right.  The ancient Babylonians, Assyrians, and other cultures used these seals a bit like bar codes for shipping goods.  You rolled these seals into clay or wax as the cargo leaves, and you could identify the owner of the cargo at its destination by the presence of the distinctive seal.  It is amazing how beautifully and delicately these hard stone cylinders are carved, and they're carved in reverse in order to leave the correct imprints.

I managed to venture away from the ancient art and view some of the famous American and European artworks as well.  This famous painting by J. M. W. Turner is called "The Slave Ship." It caused quite the stir when it was painted and was very controversial for the grisly depiction of slave bodies and chains thrown overboard so the slavers could collect on insurance payments for injured and sick slaves who wouldn't be sellable. It was painted in 1840, about 20 years before the breakout of the American Civil War, so slavery was very much a hot-button political issue at the time.  This painting probably even sparked a lot of conversations and soul-searching that eventually led to the ending of slavery in America.

Mark Twain was a little critical of the composition of the painting, but his assessment actually hits pretty close to the mark for what this explosion of orangey yellow brown and red color evokes if you sort of squint at it from afar: "Slave Ship - cat having a fit in a platter of tomatoes."  I thought it was kind of cool that Mark Twain definitely stood in front of this painting during the 19th Century, though it was probably hanging someplace else at the time.

I really got drawn in by this painting of Berber King Mulay Ahmad painted by Peter Paul Rubens in 1609.  The artist must have loved this painting himself, because he kept it in his own collection for more than 30 years.  I don't know what it was about this guy, but the glistening of his eyes and the shimmery quality of the fabrics really got me staring.

This final painting is really fun.  It is called "Museum Epiphany III" by Warren Prosperi.  It's a bit of a "meta" art work because it is a painting of people viewing all the 19th century American artwork in the beautiful gallery surrounding it.  It is a bit like looking in a mirror that's not changing, or a photograph taken on a particular day in the gallery.  If they ever change the arrangement of works in the room, or the colors of the wallpaper, the effect wouldn't work anymore.  It is the only recent painting in the room (painted in 2012) and it kind of sneaks up on you in the middle of the other works with gratifying results.