Imagination Valley

We reached Zelve open air museum in the afternoon of a lovely day. The sun was warm, but the air was fresh enough that walking was pleasant. One of our target areas was a set of interconnected chambers cut into the rock, from two stories above the entrance level to a story down. Unfortunately some workers decided to burn plastic trash in this region, and the smoke drove us all away. That’s the smoke you can see in one of the photos in the gallery below.

Living area in Zelve valley

Vanessa Cardui on an unknown flower

The day was too pleasant to remain annoyed. We found a nice double tower which had been turned into a house by carving out rooms inside. The windows in the tower were painted in decorative patterns. Apparently this area was inhabited until 1952, when the frequency of rock falls and subsidence increased to the point that the population of these villages were evacuated. The earliest inhabitants probably came here during the centuries of the Arab-Byzantine wars, somewhere between the 7th and 10th centuries CE. A thousand years of human habitation is quite as impressive as the landscape through which we walked. Spring brings flowers and butterflies. I managed to take a few photos of a Painted lady, Vanessa cardui. This is often called the most common butterfly in the world; it is found on all continents except Antarctica. Can you help me with an identification of the flower?

A living trower in Zelve valley

Window of the tower in Zelve valley

After a break for coffee and ice cream we went on to see the fabulous landscape of the Devrent valley. This is popularly known as Imagination valley because of the interesting shapes that erosion has created. The easily eroded Cemilköy ignimbrite is overlaid by the harder Kizilkaya ignimbrite. This more recent layer was laid down in volcanic activity about 4.3 million years ago. In all the interestingly named shapes that you see below, you can see a thin layer of Kizilkaya icing over the Cemilköy cake.