We left Göreme and Cappadocia today, heading for Konya – the home of the whirling dervishes’ order.

On the way we had a quick stop at the underground city of Derinkuyu. This underground city (along with several others in the region) used to be hiding place of the Byzantine Christians in the 6th and 7th century – so they could avoid persecution by passing-through Arab or Persian armies. The Derinkuyu underground cities extends to a depth of up to 60 meters and may have housed up to 20,000 people (numbers differing by source … 20,000 seems a bit too much for my taste).

From the underground city we continued to Ihlara Valley, where we had a stroll along the Melendiz River with further opportunities to visit some of the rock churches in the valley.