Our agency had booked us a Metro (one of the major brands in
these parts) bus at 8:30 that turned out to be a shuttle van
to the Nevsehir bus depot, which in contrast to the local
station is a large and impressive edifice, recently built a
ways out of town for the benefit of the longhaul trade; its
architecture, modern in a sort of folkish way, reflects the
mushroomy rock formations for which the region is famous.
Here we waited for the big bus, which showed up late enough
that we were given that little frisson of uncertainty as to
whether it would show up but early enough to make the 9:30
scheduled departure, plus or minus a few (plus).

As the bus is to the rural Cappadocians what air travel is
to us, service is fairly elaborate; there are two attendants
in addition to the driver, with frequent offerings (free) of
tea/coffee/water; about a third of the way to Ankara we had
a snack, the rather Twinkie-like Solen Luppo Tropic, whose
supposedly chocolate filling had long been absorbed by the
dryish cake.

The road to Ankara may look like a superhighway on the map,
but it's a pitted relic, sometimes four lanes, sometimes
two lanes with two more in construction, sometimes just the
two lanes, plus you get to hope for two more for your next
trip. So it's 4 hours and change for about a 130-mile trip,
counting stopping in every town plus being flagged down once
by someone at an intersection in the middle of nowhere.

We had a rest stop; while the others were filing into the
facility for toilets and Turkish delight, I stayed outside
looking at the big bleak lake in the distance and the less
than welcoming sign that advised tourists of what to do in
the unlikely event of a bandit attack.

Ankara has a huge depot, the Heathrow of bus stations.
Luckily it's reasonably well signed (in Turkish), plus I'd
read that the taxi stand was at the far side of the place,
so it was easy to find a cab to the citadel, about a half
hour trip, where we dropped our stuff off at Angora House,
the only hotel inside the citadel proper. The attendant
spoke not a single word of English but smiled nicely and
gave us our room keys with good grace. lili's room on the
second floor was pleasantly reminiscent of the guest room
at a friend's house; mine, on the third, was darker and
spookier and reminded one of the guest room at one's
grandmother's house, if one's grandmother happened to be
a rich Turk. Both rooms had two beds, and I suppose we
could have economized had we thought to do so, Ankara being
somewhat more cosmopolitan than the rest of the interior.

It hadn't started to rain yet, so we did a short examination
of the neighborhood, including the extremely uninviting and
disused fortress on the crest of the hill. Interesting that
the capital of the most important country in the region has
this instant attraction, and it just sits there moldering.
Nice views from near there over the city, though. After a
bit of this we hied ourselves to the Museum of Anatolian
Civilization, which was just down the hill a (rather
strenuous especially on the uphill return) quarter mile.
Amazing place, of which it's claimed as having the world's
greatest collection of Hittite artifacts (and a pretty
good assortment of neolithic, Ephesian, Roman, Hellenistic,
what have you - all the civilizations that have left their
mark on Cappadocia. We soaked it all up for over an hour
and then returned to the hotel and the restaurant next to
it - I never found out the name, but its address is
Kalekapisi Sok. 16, in case anyone's in the neighborhood.
There was something Fawlty about the place from the very
beginning. We were steered away from the apparently busy
downstairs (a bar I think) and sent to a deserted upper
floor, open to the outside; presently we were joined by a
pair of Russians who were sent diagonally to the opposite
end of the fairly large room. Service, such as it was, came
from the proprietor, who trekked up the stairs from time
to time as he saw fit.

First we ordered one wine and one beer, as usual, and what
came out was the usual red ink and Efes. Then we tried to
order appetizers, but everything we ordered was out: the
ritual was. Oh, we'll get the X; then he went downstairs
to fetch X and returned with the news that X was out. Then
this procedure was repeated with Y, Z, and the main courses.

Once we found out by trial and error what on the printed
menu was actually available (not much), food was quite good.
I had lamb stew (et guvec), and aside from the meat being a
tad chewy, it was excellent; lili's shishkebab was also
nice. I'm guessing that someone's wife was cooking whatever
she felt like downstairs and passing the savings on to us.

The Russians didn't seem thrilled with the treatment and
decided to leave, so we were the only ones again in the
restaurant, and it was getting cold. Eventually the
proprietor came by with some raki, and all was well. It was
only a 50-foot stagger to the hotel, though the steep and
now dark and wet steps were a bit of a hazard.

We used the hotel computer to try to check in for our
flights. There was no problem with mine, but lili was unable
to check in at all. Called UA on a fading-in-and-out cell
signal: a 20 minute roaming call mostly related to getting
her upgrade straightened out - the 1K desk read the dread
computer-generated note "not supported by a Mileage Plus
member"; as I was the supporting member, and as I'd signed
the bluey in Los Angeles with lili watching, some months
ago, I too extreme exception to that, and after a bit of
effort on both ends, her check-in was completed - with her
restored to the waitlist, but in a most unadvantageous
position. That was all the very apologetic agent could do.

I was suitably miffed by this, but the bottle of Turasan
Cappadocia 06 red that we'd picked up in Goreme helped out a
bit: it was a bit too acidy and light cherryish, but not
bad: probably more of that Okuzgozu and Bogazkere stuff.