Month: December 2019

The Isle of Man has beautiful countryside, picturesque beaches and plenty of historic castles and railways – but Greg can talk about some of those at a later date! Today I’m writing about wildlife… again.

On the Isle of Man’s most southern point, close to the Calf of Man Island, is a small section of water and a rocky islet which is populated year round by seals, and our trip to the Isle of Man took place in October 2019, which coincided with grey seal mating season (September- December).

The grey seal is the more common of the two species of seal found in Manx waters (they also get small numbers of common seals), and as around half of the global population of grey seals are found around the British coast, it should have been no surprise that we saw plenty in a place which is famous for them.

Grey seals’ hands and feet are formed into webbed flippers. They use their strong rear flippers to propel themselves through the water, while using their tail to steer. They have powerful shoulders which enable them to haul themselves onto steep and slippery rocks, which we witnessed during our visit (and which you can watch out for towards the end of our video, ‘The Isle of Man – Railways, Castles and Seals‘).

When I first heard of the underground cave cities in Turkey, I was fascinated by the idea that there was a whole city built by ancient people and designed to house thousands under the ground in times of war. When I then discovered that there is not just one of these, but thirty-six different underground cities across the region (though there are links between some of them), I wanted to get over to Turkey to see them at some point.

It was as Felicity and I were trying to decide on our next adventure, following our Honeymoon adventure in Mexico (you can watch the documentary, ‘Mexico: Mayan Mystery and Marine Majesty’ which we filmed on that trip HERE), that Felicity mentioned that she had wanted to take a hot air balloon over the ‘Fairy Chimneys’ of Cappadocia. We had a quick look, and were pleased to find that in a country of over three-hundred thousand square miles, the two things we had first on our list were within thirty miles of each other – and from there our latest travel adventure documentary, ‘Turkey – Fairy Chimneys and Underground Cities’ was born (to watch it see the links at the bottom of this post).

Of all of the underground cities the two which compete for the claim of ‘largest’ are Derinkuyu, which is the deepest, and Kaymakli, which is the widest. We decided we wanted to visit both of these, and a third, smaller city named Özkonak.

We had a very different experience visiting each of the three, and it is an order which I would definitely recommend – and a way of visiting similar styles of historical places generally.

Before visiting the first city, we, by which I mean Felicity, of course, had done some research. This gave us a basic idea of the types of things which we could expect to find in the underground cities on our arrival, and it meant that as we descended into Derinkuyu Underground City we were explorers. For the first part we had the tunnels to ourselves, and we were trying to piece together what different holes and areas might have been used for. Even when we started to bump into tour groups coming through, we managed to avoid them enough as we worked together to come up with theories. Some of these were correct – we managed to correctly identify hitching points and eating troughs in the ‘stalls’ – but with others we were wrong. For example, what looked to me to be a big mill-wheel for grinding grain turned out to be a large stone door (although we did find they had smaller mill-wheels, so I wasn’t too far off). We got to have our adventure, and really explore a place which was entirely new to us.

When we arrived at the second of the cities on our list, Kaymakli, we took up the offer of a guided tour from one of the official guides at the site. From here we could learn a little more about the history of the cities, and in particular he could show us how to ‘read’ the cities, and show us what we had got right and wrong with our own interpretations of what we saw. This was a crucial second step to having a fully rounded experience in the underground cities – we had wanted to explore ourselves, but now to reflect on what we had seen in the first city using the information we had received from the guide (who built both on years of archaeological work, and a youth spent sneaking into the tunnels to explore himself) deepened the experience.

By the time we got to our third city, therefore, we were ready to explore on our own once again, but this time armed with a lot more practical knowledge about what we were looking at.

This idea of taking a three step approach to a new experience – investigating on your own, then gaining knowledge from an expert, then applying that knowledge, is (in my opinion at least) a great way to experience a lot of new things.

I would certainly recommend it as a way to visit the underground cities of Cappadocia. If you suffer from claustrophobia, approach with caution, and try to avoid times when crowds will be busiest, but if you can handle being in the cave systems, it is well worth it!

P.P.S.

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Free in the USA on Tubi TV at:

https://tubitv.com/movies/678018/seeking-cetaceans-in-scotland

On our arrival in Mexico in early 2019, we landed in Mexico City after nightfall. After a slightly hair-raising drive out of the city in the dark, having to compete with unknown roads, a very different driving style, and wild dogs randomly appearing on the roads as we drove about thirty miles northeast, we found ourselves in a hotel a few hundred yards from the ruins of Teotihuacan – although in the dark we didn’t see them that night.

The following morning we set off for the site, and having paid our entrance fee we made two very good choices – an early arrival, and entering to park behind the Pyramid of the Sun rather than around at the main entrance to the site. This meant initially avoiding all of the stalls selling souvenirs, and meant that the famous Pyramid of the Sun was the first sight we saw on arrival, and also the first building we arrived at, allowing us to climb it before it got too busy later in the day.

The Pyramid of the Sun was built around 200CE, a couple of centuries before Teotihuacan reached its peak, and several centuries before the whole city was abandoned between about 600CE and 750CE. Why, exactly, the city was abandoned is still a matter for debate – as many public buildings were burned around the year 600, some claim it was an uprising against the rulers from within the city, while others theorise that an outside invasion began the downfall. Either way, people seem to have slowly drifted away from the city to leave it empty by 750.

As you climb up the Pyramid of the Sun, you feel the effort that must have gone into building that single temple, let along the entire city. The structure itself stands at two hundred and sixteen feet, roughly half the height of the Great Pyramid at Giza, but you are starting your climb at an altitude of a little over seven thousand feet. Having landed only the night before, and having travelled from just above sea level in our home on the Isle of Wight, we found our hearts racing by the time we reached the top – something to bear in mind if you make a visit to the site.

Greetings everyone, and welcome!

My name is Greg – magician, juggler, entertainer and travel documentary maker – and this is my blog! The main focus of this blog will be travel, history and magic, but do expect other topics to crop up as we go along.

Along with my wife (who for reasons of our work at Steampunk events and a series of Steampunk inspired audio-books I tend to refer to as Lady Felicity), we began this year launching a new adventure in our lives – the creation of travel adventure documentaries taking us around the world to share the sights, history, and wildlife in as  many countries as possible!

It all began this January, when we set off to Mexico on our honeymoon. We decided on this as our destination because it combined Lady Felicity’s love of marine wildlife, and her dream to travel to Magdalena Bay in the Baja California of Mexico, where at the right time of year you can take a boat out to see grey whales in the wild, with my desire to see ancient ruins in the jungles, and basically to be Indiana Jones (without the tomb-raiding aspects of his stories!).

From swimming with the whale sharks in La Paz (pictured below) to exploring ruins such as El Tajin (pictured above) we travelled all over in an attempt to see as much wildlife and history as we could fit in to a month.

About halfway through the month it occurred to me just how amazing the footage we were filming was, and just what a great experience it would be to share with the world, and with my background in video making and entertainment, we decided that we could create a travel documentary.

So our adventures began! In this blog I will be delving a little deeper into the history and stories behind some of the places which we have visited on our travels, a chance to provide more information than we could in our videos.

In the meantime, you can Watch The Mexico Travel Documentary Here and watch the videos of our latest travels on the Greg and Felicity Adventures Website!

Happy adventuring, and please, take unbelievably good care of yourselves, and of each other!

Greg