Last Friday I found myself with a day off and thought it would be nice to go revisit scenic Anavarsa castle which is situated atop what must be a 1,000+ foot cliff. The first time we saw it we were on an awesome rock climbing trip at the base of the cliff, saw the amazing castle, and headed back the following weekend to explore the ruins. In the photo below, the little dots in the field below the cliff are actually sheep and cows if that helps give you a sense of scale.
It was humid as hell out and I felt like I was dying of aids for some reason, so you’ll have to bare with me since I wasn’t exactly in my happy photo place. Anyways, Anavarsa dates back longer than our recorded history from the area and from what I have been told, the ruins have yet to be excavated by the Turkish government. The history can be read on the Anazarbus Wiki, but the jest of it is that the castle and settlement below pre-date the Roman Empire and if you lived there prior to our times, you would most likely die in a battle or in an earthquake while being confused with multiple name changes to the settlement; all seemed to happen constantly to this site and it is absolutely remarkable to me that anything remains at all.
I will go back and take better photos to prove to you that a lot more remains than what my pictures present, but there is quite a bit of ruined structures from aqueducts, to arch-type gates, walls, and of course the remains of a very spread-out castle. I did play a bit with my new 70-200 bokeh cannon, but I am figuring out that zoomed in above 130’ish and above and wide open pretty much obliterates the background so much that I need to actually stop up to bring in some soft details to create a more interesting background.
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