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About 100 feet up, the basket brushes the tree tops with an audible scrape and then floats inexorably towards a rock face. The rising sun has set off the delicate shrimp tint of Rose Valley to stunning effect but the 14 of us, suspended from a giant butane-powered balloon, are unable to concentrate on the view just yet.
Was it, er, possible for pilot Baris Pehivan of Kapadokya Balloons to change direction, someone delicately enquires. No, he replies cheerfully, he has no control of the direction in which the balloon travels. That depends on the wind, he can only regulate the height, he adds. Then he energetically pumps one of two levers above him, sending spires of fiery gas into the balloon, and we drift over the lip of the valley.
"Just like ice cream, no?" he grins, pointing down. Reassured, we turn our attention to the strawberry and vanilla swirls of Rose Valley before we're over the ruddy striations of the Red Valley. Over the next hour or so, the ungodly 4 am wake-up call is forgotten. Hundreds of feet below is spectacular installation art by nature. Rising from the central Anatolian plains, Cappadocia's quirkily beautiful topography has been a work-in-progress for some 60 million years. Millennia of volcanic eruptions spread blankets of soft ash over the landscape creating a soft rock technically known as "tuff". Wind and water erosion have moulded this rock into dramatic, surreal nature scapes shaded in rose, red, maroon, gold, yellow, grey, black, brown and many shades in between.
The day before, our guide Cem Gulluoglu - I lost a bet on pronouncing his surname, redolent with dots and hooks of the Turkish alphabet - had taken us for a trek, pointing out the famed "fairy chimneys", pillars eroded into intriguing shapes, and the outlines of a camel, a rabbit and Caspar the Friendly Ghost serendipitously etched in the rock.
Inevitably, man discovered the value of this soft rock. The formations are punctured by (now empty) cave dwellings, some of them rudimentary duplex apartments with multiple rooms connected through stairways, the more elongated unwittingly resembling Ku Klux Clan outfits. Between 1800 and 1200 BCE, the Hittites found this a handy refuge from competing empires, creating networks of underground settlements.
From the 1st century CE, Cappadocia became the hideout of Christians fleeing persecution from Rome before Emperor Constantine's 313 CE edict decriminalising Christian worship. They also hewed these rocks into monasteries and churches which they decorated in luminous colours with natural dyes. The best-known is the Goreme Open Air Museum, a complex of monasteries and painted churches from the 10th to the 12th centuries.
Before you enter the churches, arm yourself with the relevant information. Goreme became a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1984 and is still being preserved and restored. In the interests of conservation, talking and flashlight photography are discouraged (Egypt does the same for some of its temples) so guiding is prohibited within. Cem used the practical solution of a picture book to explain the paintings before we walked in to look around in wonder.
In more modern times, the higher caves served a mundane purpose: locals used them to breed pigeons. This was not, as I romantically believed, to serve as a postal service but to gather the poop for fertiliser. Thankfully, this agri-business is defunct. Instead, the thousands of caves here serve the cause of modern tourism in the form of hotels. Don't miss this experience. Esbelli Evi, where we stayed, is among the oldest. It was comfortable without being overwhelming and done up with tasteful eccentricity by its gently hospitable owner, Suha Ersoz: a collection of brass pots, books, an old model of a car and a Collector's Edition of Beatles LPs added an attractively domestic touch to the rooms. Jazz standards purred in the reception area, the staff agreeably friendly.
In the balloon, Baris prepares to land. This exercise consists of furious radio chatter between him and one Yusuf who is driving the trailer on which we are to land. It is a complex operation, involving exactitude and an understanding of wind flows and so on.
It seems to take a long time.
Baris orders us to get into "landing position", which requires us to half-squat and brace ourselves against a rope. An eddy plays spoilsport. We stand. More chatter. We half-squat again. This time we're down, young lads grab the basket and manhandle it onto the trailer. On terra firma, we gulp down the celebratory champagne that's handed out. Sure, it's only 7.30 am, but who cares.
GETTING THERE FROM ISTANBUL
By air: There are hour-long daily flights to Kayseri, the nearest airport. Turkish Airlines flies to Istanbul Ataturk Airport, which is on the European side of the city. Low-cost airlines Pegasus Airlines and AnadoluJet also ply between Kayseri and Sabiha Gokcen Airport, which is on the Asian side. Prices vary but as of today start from $45.
By road: A car trip takes around eight and a half hours and is a steep $750 (inclusive of fuel and VAT). There are many daily intercity bus services and the cost is nearly the same as a cheap flight but the journey takes 10 to 11 hours
By train: "In Turkey trains are not very convenient, this is why they are not recommended," says Eyup Yildiz of Argent Tours.
SOME COSTS
Hotels: 4-star hotels start from $55-60 and go up to $120. Cave hotels also start from $60 and, subject to location and levels of luxury, can go up to $1,500. All rates are inclusive of breakfast and VAT. But "it is possible to find a room for any budget ," says Eyup.
Hot air balloon: A steep $250 per person, inclusive of a pick-up from and drop to your hotel, breakfast before and champagne afterwards. More than worth it, though.
