CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: planning record, not independently verified geometry.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distances and riding times are planning figures. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A 394 km round trip from Derinkuyu - roughly 6 h 49 in the saddle. It goes by way of Yesilöz site, Soganli site, Karlik site and back through Soganli site. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,550 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 29 km this is Turkey Cappadocia Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Kaymakli sits in the soft volcanic country of Cappadocia, about eleven kilometres from Derinkuyu and eighteen from Nevşehir, and from the road you would never guess what is under your wheels. The village is ordinary: flat-roofed houses, tractors, a few carpet shops. The wonder is below, a city dug downward into tuff, the pale rock that ash from ancient volcanoes pressed into something a person can cut with a hand tool and that hardens with air.
Read the complete Subterranean city of Kaymakli write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Subterranean city of Kaymakli is where the day begins. Next is Yesilöz site.
Cappadocia was made by volcanoes and carved by people. Millions of years ago, the volcanoes of central Anatolia, Erciyes and Hasan, covered the plateau in thick layers of ash that hardened into a soft rock called tuff, and wind and water have since eroded it into the cones, pinnacles and ridges that are known as fairy chimneys. People found the rock easy to carve, and for thousands of years they have dug homes, churches, storerooms and whole underground cities into it. The area is a World Heritage site, and it is hard to find a corner without a cave or a dovecote cut into a cliff.
Read the complete Yesilöz site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Yesilöz site comes up about 71 km into the recorded legs. Next is Soganli site.
Soğanlı lies in a side valley of Cappadocia that most tour buses skip, south-east of Ürgüp and Yeşilhisar, on the slopes of the volcanic uplands. The name means with onions, which tells you something about the humble character of the place. The valley sides are made of soft volcanic tuff, which the local Christians carved out in the Byzantine centuries into churches, chapels, monasteries, and houses. Many of the rock churches date from the ninth to the thirteenth century and keep fragments of frescoes: Karabaş, the Yılanlı or Snake church, the Barbara church and others, whose names reflect old stories more than documented history.
Read the complete Soganli site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 132 km into the recorded legs you reach Soganli site. Next is Karlik site.
The Karlık church, one of the rock-cut sanctuaries of the district, is usually described as a dark church, with a simple cross-in-square plan cut into the stone and painted decoration that has faded over the centuries. Many rock churches here were cut by monks in the tenth and eleventh centuries, and their interiors imitate built architecture, with carved domes, pillars and arches that look like masonry but are all hollowed from a single mass of rock.
Read the complete Karlik site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Karlik site, about halfway. Next is back through Soganli site.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Soganli site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Soganli site sits at 262 km, about halfway. Next is back through Yesilöz site.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Yesilöz site write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
back through Yesilöz site comes up about 325 km into the recorded legs. Next is Subterranean city of Kaymakli.
Return visit. Read the place description above.
Read the complete Subterranean city of Kaymakli write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Subterranean city of Kaymakli closes the day.
Subterranean city of Kaymakli → Yesilöz site is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Yesilöz site → Soganli site is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Soganli site → Karlik site is 66 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Karlik site → back through Soganli site is 66 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Soganli site → back through Yesilöz site is 61 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
back through Yesilöz site → Subterranean city of Kaymakli is 71 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.