Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Hierapolis of Phrygia, Pamukkale, Turkey, Nov 2012

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.


Address: Denizli Merkez, 20280 Denizli Province, Turkey.

2 notes of inspiration:

nohas said...

Assalam..seronoknya baca travelog ni..Turki, negara idaman saya, semoga dapat menjejakkan kaki ke sini..

Unaizah said...

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 :-)