I pictured at most maybe a few hot air balloons. Cappadocia had hundreds. Ours alone held thirty people across nine compartments, and by mid morning the sky over a single field was so crowded with balloons it hardly looked real. Somehow the highlight of the day was a lady making a carpet.

A dryer with a water trap you have to empty by hand, a coastline I kept hunting for in a town that has none, a hotel room carved out of solid rock, and a four a.m. wake up call. European appliances and landlocked Cappadocia both had lessons for me this weekend. You learn something new every day.

How little sleep can a person actually function on? I managed two hours in the first forty, three in the first forty-eight, and a knock at the door every time I closed my eyes. When I skipped the Turkish bath to rest, I earned a lecture on powering through. Eight more days of this to go.

I immigration, customs, and (miraculously) was reunited with my checked bag. Then: a vanishing Uber driver, a cash-only taxi, a sketchy neighborhood, and riddle-like instructions to get into the rental house. It was less hassle getting from Tennessee to Istanbul than from the taxi to my bed.

Delta could not decide how to get me to Istanbul: through Amsterdam, then Paris, then Dallas and London, then Paris again, depending on which agent I last spoke to. One rep fixed it; the next un-fixed it because, "it was weather related." I have now traveled 14 hours and not left my home state.