Dear Diary,
After savoring beef kebab with saffron rice for lunch, we bid
farewell to Selcuk and looked forward to arriving at Pamukkale. There were two
tourist attractions that we would be visiting. The first one was Hierapolis, an
ancient city located on hot springs in classical Phrygia.
The Southern Byzantine Gate
Hierapolis, which means sacred city, boasts of hot springs
with thermal spa installation. It was declared as UNESCO World Heritage Site in
1988. In ancient times, it used to be a cosmopolitan city in which people from
different backgrounds interacted. They crammed the place for its hot springs
which are believed to have healing abilities.
Infused with Greek mythology, Hierapolis is also famous for
its historical architectural ruins such as temples, churches, theater, gymnasium,
necropolis, etc. The ruins also reveal Roman influences as Hierapolis underwent
Roman ruling too.
Besides hot springs and ancient ruins, other attractions
here are Pamukkale Museum (I didn’t even realize there’s a museum there!),
Sacred Pool were visitors can swim with antiquities (Again, we weren’t aware of
this!), Temple of Apollo, Plutonium, Martyrium of St. Philip and several others.
As we reached Hierapolis quite late in the evening, we didn’t really get the
chance to explore the ruins. We only got to dip our feet in the hot springs and
enjoyed insanely breathtaking view….to be continued.
Sources: whc.unesco.org, www.sacred-destinations.com
Address: Denizli Merkez, 20280 Denizli Province, Turkey.
2 notes of inspiration:
Assalam..seronoknya baca travelog ni..Turki, negara idaman saya, semoga dapat menjejakkan kaki ke sini..
Nohas - Salam. Insya Allah, satu hari nanti sampai la tu ke Turki. Semuanya bermula dgn impian. Sebelum ni Turki tempat kedua yg ingin saya lawati (after Mekah), syukur both places saya dah sampai. Glad you like my entries :-)
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