“Turkey, Hierapolis”

• September 30, 2020
• By Daryl
• 1 Comment

Time period travel would be the optimum transport today. Seeing Roman or Greek ruins always conjures thoughts of this nature. We don’t research our destinations too much in advance. We only need a picture to spark a desire that needs quenching. Terraced aquamarine-colored pools with brilliant white limestone banks, are the only thing I knew of this location. 

We traveled good roads passing crops and follow fields with grapes and olive trees mixed in. Turkey, like many countries has trees planted, and all seem to be the same size. Marble quarries scar the hill edges, and they were seen from great distances. 

The Maps diverts us in inexplicable mazes in villages. We were  told to stop in a residential backstreet. We knew this was wrong, and we could see a white reflection from a hillside and we headed there. With no signs, we wander around the edges of this out of place, lime-looking deposited on the hillside. Soon we enter a parking lot to what must been our destination. 

We get a ticket to park, then one to enter. A golf buggy is available to drive us or a twenty minute walk. Anytime someone tells you a twenty minute walk, it means hours of walking. We pay for a buggy and wait. We are surrounded by a Roman graveyard with crypts all over and a Roman stone road leading through the middle. The main part of the city was close by.

Soon our buggy arrived and we were off, with a private tour. We drove past the graveyard crypts and stone buildings. Soon we entered a Roman city with huge Herculaneum and then past foundations. In the distance a Roman Theatre was seen on the upper reaches of the hillside. We passed the Frontinus Gate of the city. A Roman bath flanks was on one side and olive oil press station for olive processing on the other side. 

We entered  the triple-arched monument entrance at the Frontinus Gate to the city with stones five feet wide forming the roadway. Pillars line the roadway into the market and Main Street. Further down, the blinding, white pools come into view. The water was a light blue and the whole side of the road is a park-like area with the blue pools of water cascading to multiple pools just below, then cascading to the next. At the bottom is a large pool to collect all the water for mineral baths. People had gathered at the pools taking in the view, with the healing powers of the brew. The healing powers are so beneficial from these heated waters, people come from miles around. They purportedly heal everything from arthritis to zygomycosis.

The overall impression of the area is one of awe. The city remnants can be seen all over the surrounding hillsides. Some catastrophic event must have left the area inhabitable probably ruining the water supply and most of the buildings. There is lots to see still and visions of lives lived in the past filled our minds. 

Every time we visit ancient sites like Hierapolis, I wish we could travel back into the heyday to see life as it was back then.