This trip started out with just Turkey….the highlight of the trip was to be a gulet cruise along the Lycian coast. Initially we had enough people interested to look into doing a private charter but as often happens as time went by they changed their minds and it ended up being only our friends, Rae and Glen, and Ken and I. We then had to go for a “tour”, which morphed into a second week tour of historic sites along the Lycian coast. It was an excellent trip booked thru Explore Worldwide. As with all our holidays, while still working, time was precious so we tried to include whatever else seemed to be logical add-ons to get the most out of our vacation. With the Greek island of Rhodes just a hop, skip and ferry ride away from our Turkey trip starting point we worked that in too…..the Rhodes had to go to Rhodes!!! The best flight options to get us there and back from Turkey were thru Frankfurt…but leaving a few days earlier than we’d planned so made good use of our start days in Mainz, Germany.
This journal is in 4 parts: Part 1 Mainz and Rhodes, Part 2 Turkey – Tour of Ancient Sites, Part 3 Lycian Coast Gulet Cruise and Part 4 Istanbul
Mon June 15
Up early to catch the ferry. A quick coffee and croissant and we were off. Duncan had called a taxi for us. He could only get in as far as the square a short walk away so we didn’t have to rattle our suitcases too far over the cobbles.
Arrived at the marina by 8. Picked up our boarding passes and had to pay another 15E each for “port charges”?? Went thru customs and on to the ferry.
Ferry ride was about an hour. One of the Dolphin fast ferries. No outside areas, but not much to see enroute anyway.
Arrived in Marmaris around 11. Thru customs and got our visa ($50US paid in cash only). Found an ATM at the ferry terminal to get some Turkish Lira. Initially thought we’d take the bus, or dolmus, but found a taxi driver who would drive us all the way to Dalyan for 80TL ($25CDN), which is about double the price of the bus but also takes one third of the time!
Very hot….very, very hot. Didn’t realize until we were on the road that our taxi did not have air conditioning!!! Driver was an older guy who spoke about as much English as we spoke Turkish (other than please and thank you…that would be NONE!)…..luckily some other guy had organized the ride for us so he knew where we were going! Taxi was in a pretty rough shape…..torn leather seats, one of the windows only went down an inch or so and his front seat was filled with papers and books…..a bit of a mess!
Off we went in the 100+ degrees with the windows down as far as they’d go. Of course it was still hot, but also very dry here so a lot of dust blowing around and into the car. He stopped for gas!! Came out with ice cold bottles of water for us, which was very nice. He talked pretty much the entire way pointing at things but we had no clue what he was telling us.
We came to a roadblock!!! So we kind of made signs that we were worried and started getting out all our ID…..no, no he said. The roadblock guy said it was to check to make sure the driver had a valid taxi license, nothing to do with us. Next we stopped at a huge tap type thing. It was a big pipe about 20ft tall with a spigot/spout hanging from the top…..he told us to roll up the windows and then he drove under it and let the water just run over the car for a couple of minutes!! Found out later that these are along the highway to help cool off cars so they don’t overheat when it’s a 100+ degrees. Interesting!
Back on the highway and the windows open again we had not just dust blowing in but the bits of spray from the water too. We were literally stuck to the seats most of the way. Nice drive though, mostly on the highway with hills/mountains off in the distance and a mix of very dry land and some bits of forest.
Arrived in Dalyan at the hotel around 1. I opened the car door and we kind of rolled out …..I felt like I’d be on some leg of a journey on the Amazing Race!!
Rae and Glen were just coming out the door of the hotel when we arrived. They’d just checked in and were in search of cold beer. We got checked in, dropped the luggage. Oner Hotel….kind of a funky place with helter skelter rooms. Ours is pretty good on the main floor. R & G are up in the attic! Found R & G at the patio bar. Met Ilsa from Belgium, who will be in our tour group.
Enjoyed a very nice cool (not cold) beer and heard our first call to prayer!! Was just amazing to be here in Turkey! And HOT!
Wandered around the town heading towards the water…..kind of a canal I guess. Dalyan is a cute little place….quite touristy. Lots of Germans here. Had a great lunch at a little place right on the water, Ceyhan Restaurant, where all the little tour boats are docked and with a great view of the tombs in the cliffs. How cool was that! They look amazing…..can’t even imagine how they managed to do it.
Headed back thru town to find a store to replace the battery for my watch! Guy replace it for 5TL (less than $1CDN!). Stopped for coffee at “Gerda’s Café”, which is really just a little kiosk along the side of the road. She’s German….came to Dalyan 30 years ago, met a Turk, married that Turk and is still very happily here! She recommended a place for dinner along the river.
Back at the hotel we had a nice little swim…..mostly to just get some of the grit and grime off. Hotel is OK. 2 star, pretty spartan but exceptionally clean, which is the main thing. We’ve got twin beds in our room and a little balcony with A chair. Looks out over someone’s garden and small mosque.. No top sheets on the beds….only a blanket sort of….looks more like a big bath towel. No AC so probably not going to need anymore than that.
Met our tour guide and group in the lobby. 24 of us on the first tour, 6 that will carry on to the gulet next week. Got all our info etc. Met back there at 7:15 to go off to dinner. Not having done a tour before, 24 seems like a lot of people!!
Walked in a different direction to the restaurant. Still very warm. I had the cheese rolls for an appie, which was feta cheese rolled up in phyllo pastry….really really good. Main course was a chicken casserole, also really good. Ken had pizza that was just OK.
After dinner we went shopping for our picnic lunch for tomorrow. Found a little shop still open that had lots of goodies….cheese buns, more cheese, crackers, bananas, nuts.
Back to the hotel around 10:30 to empty a backpack and repack it for our tour tomorrow.
Long, busy but fun day! More calls to prayer!
Tues June 16
Slept really good! That is until the call to prayer around 5:15 …..our wake up call this morning!!! They amplify the call thru loudspeakers so you can’t help but hear it, no matter where you are. Did manage to fall back to sleep until 6.
Breakfast at the hotel at 7:30. Thought the tea was coffee lol….coffee was instant Nescafe, at least it was coffee! OK little buffet with breads, cheeses, meat that looked like bologna, hard boiled eggs, cereal and the best yogurt with honey and cherry preserves. Also had cherry juice, which was a bit tart but really good.
Grabbed our stuff for the day and off to where the boats are along the river to go to Caunos or Kaunus (have seen it spelled both ways).
Going down the river was really neat. There are tall reeds on both sides, very quiet. The boats have to go very slow because of the turtles, which are protected. The guide explained the tombs on the walls…..they’re from the 4thc BC! Incredible!! The tombs are exactly as they were when they were discovered….no restoration has been done and in amazingly good condition.
Came to our first stop for the Caunos town ruins. The theatre is really still quite intact with the odd tree growing out of it here and there. The views from the top looked back towards Dalyan and out to Iztuzu beach. Hardly any people at this site so it was very peaceful. Caunos was a very busy and important sea port at one time. Saw the agora and fountain in the main square, still columns standing with writing on them that explains the rules of trade and the applicable taxes etc. Silting over the centuries has left the sea off in the distance now.
Spent a couple hours there. TG (tour guide….can’t remember her name Che-yen maybe?) also explained the restoration process. They can’t use original materials and depending on when the restoration took place must use different marble, stone, concrete etc. of certain colours and types based on the year/century etc. to distinguish restored bits from original bits…..this is based on requirements from the Int’l Archeological Society. Sometimes restorations are done many years apart, so this helps to identify what is still original and what period restorations were done! Very interesting! Amazing ruins and history!
Back on the boat and on to the beach. Iztuzu beach is magnificent! 4.5 km long, very nice soft and very hot sand, they have a wooden walkway almost right to the water. The sea is beautiful. Nice clear and very clean looking, quite warm too. Went for a nice swim to cool down.
Everyone went back to sit on the boat in the shade to have our lunch, which was really quite good. Chatted with TG (tour guide until I remember her name!!) for a bit then back to the beach cantina for an Efes beer and to take some more pics. A really nice little spot! A great place to have spent the afternoon. Not many people here either…..incredible to have such a big beautiful beach with so few people.
Nice cruise down the river on the way back. Saw a number of turtles…..huge ones! Also saw the fishing contraptions….very interesting. So peaceful cruising along….very quiet and very few other boats.
Out for a bit of a walk thru the town before dinner. Stopped at a little street bar where the guy at the travel agency next door helped us order our drinks lol….chatted with him for a while.
Walked to “Safran” the restaurant that Gerda told us about yesterday. Ken and I had the grilled crab, which was excellent. Came with fries, rice and green beans. A couple of glasses of wine. Total bill 65TL ($20CDN if that!).
Wandered around town again browsing in and out of shops and had to shop for our picnic for tomorrow.
What a great day!
Wed June 17
Good morning at 5 again thanks to the call to prayer! Do people really get up at that time and go??
Our tour guides name is Ceylan. She is an archology major at the university and she’s great! So knowledgeable and loves Turkey. Her brother is a vulcanologist and travels all over the world. Told her about seeing all the stuff in the British Museum and was hoping that they’d get it back. She agreed but also said that many of the great treasures were not being looked after. Items were being destroyed by weather and vandals back then so at least they have been preserved. Interesting!
Leaving Dalyan today. The ruins at Alinda was our main tour. About 3 hours by bus with a couple of 15 minute breaks. Terrible bus! Small, cold (!!) and uncomfortable. Had to wear longer shorts or pants and tee shirts with sleeves today because we go thru Karpuzlu, which is a very traditional muslim town, to get to Alinda.
The road goes up and up….way up! Very hot and initially very windy. A very HOT wind. The Alinda ruins are spectacular. There’s an aqueduct, an amazing theatre with olive trees growing out of it everywhere. Had our picnic lunch in the shade under them sitting on seats that were built in 400BC!! The views of the valleys on both sides is unbelievable. At the top of the site there are cisterns that they actually lined with concrete type stuff to hold the water. They had a clay pipe system to get the water to the wells in the old town just below it. On to the agora, which was a bit hard to distinguish what was what, but the agora stoa were awesome. Many still standing. You can see that the agora was at least two levels. Not much has been excavated at this site but more will be starting next year. Definitely not a touristy place probably because it’s not that easy to get to and if we’d been on our own I highly doubt it would have even been on our radar….so a tour was a good idea. The site is quite big and took a few hours to cover it. A lot of walking/hiking/climbing in 40C temps and not a heck of a lot of shade.
Walked/hiked back down to the “new town” (Karpuzlu, which wasn’t really new!) and stopped at a little bar in the town square. Many old men sitting around, drinking tea and playing backgammon. As soon as we sat down the waiter came out with a little spray bottle of lemon water for us to wash our hands!
I feel sorry for the cows here…..they just sort of wander around the streets. They can’t run off because they have a rope attached to one of their feet that goes thru a ring in their nose so that when they take a step their head sort of gets pulled down….very sad I thought.
Quite a drive to our stop for tonight in Gulluk. Some road construction or whatever created a couple hour detour. Hotel is called Ozer Gulluk. Very, very basic but clean. Nice deck with a view across the water. Bodrum is just around the bay.
Only place to have dinner was the hotel so we had all pre-ordered when we arrived. I had chicken, Ken had kefte (meatballs), both very good. I think they were 13L each. Included mixed appie platter and some seaweed with butter and garlic (ok…) and dessert. Beautiful big outdoor seating area. Lovely sunset over the water. Couldn’t sit out there too long tho…..mosquitoes were really bad.
Another really good and very interesting day.
Thurs June 18
Up early. Perfect view of sunrise from our deck. It was already hot at 6AM.
Basic continental type hotel breakfast.
Our first stop today was Didyma. A spectacular ruin right in the middle of the city/town. There are two magnificent carved columns and one uncarved one still standing tall. All around the site are sections, or chunks, of columns that have tumbled. Presuming they’re all marble…..they look like big solid tires lying here, there and everywhere. The carvings on the column bases look as crisp as if they were carved a year or two ago….just amazing. All seem to be different, don’t know why or what they represent. Quite incredible that no one has built a hotel or two around it since this is a pretty touristy town.
The temple of Apollo has been excavated and was second in importance to the one in Greece. Also the temple of Artemis which isn’t excavated. It’s really quite unbelievable to see it all just sitting there. A column or two just laying there where it fell and broke into sections. Some of the carving is so detailed and intricate. Just a beautiful historic ruin!
Had a great buffet lunch at a restaurant across the street (10L). Really good couscous with a spicy tomato sauce.
Next stop was Miletus. An ancient town from around 700BC. The theatre is incredible. Held 15,000 people. The agora was beautiful and has a few restored columns. The Baths of Faustina still had a couple statues. You can see what was the swimming pool and how the water came in thru holes in the walls.
A lady with a little cart selling fresh squeezed orange juice…..very, very good and refreshing in the heat. Incredibly HOT!
Miletus was once a port! Hard to believe now as you can see the sea way off in the distance (great views all around). The harbour silted in and eventually ended it’s importance as a busy sea port.
On to Priene…..I think my fav place so far! Again, you can see where there used to be sea but long since silted in. This place must really have been something in it’s day. Way up on hill overlooking the valley and out to sea. The temple of Athena is pretty grand. Five columns are still standing (restored). You can still see roads and gutters, just like at Pompeii. The theatre is beautiful, still with some of the carved seats for the rich people. Tons of pieces just lying everywhere…..like a big jigsaw puzzle that was dumped and then scattered around the room….can’t even imagine how they put it together for restoration. The site is surrounded on 3 sides by beautiful and very fragrant pine forests with rocky cliffs behind it and with spectacular views looking over the valley and out towards the sea. Definitely the prettiest place so far.
Left there around 5 and arrived in Selcuk just before 6. We’re staying here two nights at the Canberra Hotel. A treat to not have to pack up in the morning! Very nice people that run it, 2 brothers.
Nice basic rooms….we have two balconies! Was great to have a nice big shower! You get incredibly dirty at these sites because of the dust and sweat! Also did some “shower laundry” since we’ve lots of room to hang it up outside so it will dry!
Selcuk is a neat place, not too big maybe 20,000 or so people. There is an old mosque with a big storks nest on the top. St John’s Basilica, a medieval castle and some other ruins up on the hill. Also the Temple of Artemis, which is, or was, one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world. City/town is a real mix of “city” and “country”. Lots of traffic, buses and all the usual city stuff, along with tractors and ox/goat carts mixed in. Quite an enchanting place I think!
Ceylan was organizing a group dinner but we didn’t join them. Met R & G and had drinks at the hotel rooftop bar. Wonderful view from up there of the basilica and ruins on the hill, which get lit up at night!
Wandered off looking for some place for dinner and found that they were just setting up for the night market that opens at 8! Still hot at night but much more comfortable than with the hot sun beating down on you so makes sense to have the market at night.
Found a little restaurant just off the plaza. Had our first rakis! I ordered the stuffed peppers, Rae ordered the stuffed eggplant so we traded half of each…..very good. Also had chicken souvlaki, Ken had beef….both were good. Went to the market and wandered around for a while.
Back to the hotel around 11 and did laundry! Great because we’ll have an extra day for it to dry and with the 2 balconies lots of places to hang it all up.
Across from our hotel is a home with a big garden and yard….it’s almost midnight and there are kids out there kicking a soccer ball around….young kids, like 5 or 6!! I guess this is when they play…way too hot during the day to even move!
Big day tomorrow….Ephesus! Can’t believe we’re really here.
Fri June 19
Hello!!!! Call to prayer at like 5AM! Sounded like it was right in our room…..which it almost was since the mosque is about 50ft away!! You cannot escape it. Watched all of about 10 people arrive for prayer….ah sigh.
Just stayed up and went to the roof for coffee and some quiet time before breakfast. Beautiful….and already HOT! Usual continental type breakfast….no yogurt here or the last place tho.
Ephesus today! Just another incredible place. Still much excavating going on and will be for years and years. The site is huge and just as spectacular as I was hoping it would be. Theatre still has some of it’s carved seats. Can easily see the water cistern/piping system that was used. The walk down to the library is all ruins in various stages of restoration.
Hadrian’s temple and others, Trajans fountain, what were public bathrooms, a bathhouse, houses etc. On the walkway there are big metal rings embedded in the stones every 20 ft or so……these were used to help bring carts/wagons with supplies, or for moving big hunks of stone/marble for building up the hill!! They would tie rope or ? to the carts/stones and then thru the rings to make a pulley type thing to get the stuff up the hill. Quite brilliant really.
You catch glimpses of the Library on the walk down. Really beautiful. So much detail to look at. The Grand Theatre is extremely well preserved and I’m sure was once very beautiful too. It held 25,000 people which was a lot for that time. Because the acoustics are still so good it’s been used a number of times for modern day concerts….Elton John, Pavarotti etc. would be wonderful to see.
On the way out you walk down a path thru a very nice pine forest. There are ancient “milestones” displayed! Like our mile markers today…..who knew they used them 2000 years ago!
If you are a ruin junkie Turkey is the place to get a good fix!! And we’re not done yet…..a couple more days to go!!
Lunch today was rather unique! Went to a little roadside restaurant where we had to take our shoes off and sit on pillows at little tables to eat. Definitely not a tourist type place and great experience at a traditional eatery. I had a mixed pancake which had meat, onion, cheese and spinach in it……very good. Ken had their specialty which was called “Meleman”. It comes in a nifty little cast iron casserole dish….eggs (sort of scrambled), cheese, onion and hot peppers still bubbling away. All came with tea in little glasses. A fun place!
Back to Selcuk to see what was left of the temple of Artemis….only a couple columns and basically just a field with bits of the ruins. Then to the Efes Museum where some original bits from Ephesus are. Quite a nice little museum with fairly good descriptions. Some of the huge sarcophagus.
Crossed the street to a park where there was a snack bar set up….had a drink and relaxed under the shade trees for a while. Some beautiful, huge hollyhocks….bright red and some must be 10ft tall!
R & G went shopping, Ken and I back to the hotel. Ken snoozed and I went to the roof to read. Great view from up there. You can see the hills all around, the old 14thC fort, St John’s basilica in one direction and out to sea in the other. Chatted with the owner. Really nice guy.
Ended up having dinner up there with R & G and Colin and Mary (will also be on the gulet). Dinner was really good. The chef deboned my fish, which made it really enjoyable!! Rae and I shared the stuffed peppers and mushrooms….all very good.
The rest of the group joined us later for drinks and told us about their Turkish bath at the hammam……lots of laughs. Kind of wished we’d done that now, sounded like quite the experience.
Great day!
Sat June 20
Up early for breakfast and checkout and on to Aphrodesias (named for Aphrodite).
Aphrodesias was incredible! It’s one of the best sites yet. Another new favorite! And not many people at all. Restoration work is going on all the time. There is a display of carved masks that are in unbelievable shape. The theatre was awesome as well as the temple with all the columns but it was the stadium that was the best. It’s HUGE. Still more excavating to be done…..they have so far only uncovered the tops of the lower entrances. The Sebasteion will supposedly rival the library at Ephesus when the restoration is completed.
Terrific museum. Set up much like the Elgin Marbles display in the British Museum.
Very hot but such a great place to just wander around. Some beautiful bits of mosaic floors near Hadrian’s baths, lots of columns from Aphrodites temple still standing and the tomb or monument dedicated to Kenan Erim, the guy who started all the excavations. Really, really enjoyed this place!
Stopped for lunch at a neat place. Huge restaurant with a big covered and nicely shaded outdoor eating area. Lots of beautiful flowers and trees. They brought out a trolley with all the samples of the stuff they serve. You just point at whatever you wanted. I had roasted beets and moussaka, Ken had cheese rolls and stuffed mushrooms. Each dish came in a small cast iron casserole…..would love to take a couple of them home but they weigh a ton. The moussaka was excellent. Had tea with lunch. This place and the place the other day do not serve alcohol.
Our hotel in Pamukkale is kind of cute. Pamuksu Hotel. Called a boutique hotel and they are trying. Nice big pool and beautiful grounds….back is all covered in vines. Our room is ok, clean enough which is the main thing, with a deck that overlooks the front street. They have housecoats and flipflop slippers in the closet. The sink leaks….had to use all our towels to dry the bathroom floor! Front desk sent someone up right away, which was good.
Had just enough time for a quick swim before heading up to Hierapolis and Pamukkale. Good time to go in the late afternoon when it’s not quite as hot and also got to enjoy a beautiful sunset.
What an amazing place Pamukkale is! The “cotton castle”. Was hoping to get a better view of it on the drive up, but no. It looks really spectacular….all the different levels of pools and the bright blue water. We could walk into the upper level pools…..you have to take your shoes off but luckily it wasn’t too slippery other than in a few places where algae had built up. It’s so smooth! The water is warm but not hot. Tons of people up there still at almost 7PM. They don’t let people into the natural pools further down the mountain anymore to preserve them so instead they built some fake ones that you can sit and soak in up on the first level.
A nice boardwalk takes you to another set of pools that you aren’t allowed in… fantastic views. Took tons of pics. Spent a ½ hour or so wandering thru there then off on our tour of Hierapolis. Hierapolis is probably one of the most spectacular settings of anywhere we’ve been so far. High up on the mountain behind Pamukkale.
Beautiful theatre, lots of restorations. The pathway to the agora was through sort of a wheat field that was just glowing golden with the sun setting behind it….really beautiful!
The roadway to the agora was pretty well preserved. The arches at the end were great. Not much else had been restored other than the theatre. From there we walked thru the necropolis where there are hundreds and hundreds of sarcophagi scattered all over, some in almost perfect condition, some stacked on top of others, some in varying degrees of ruin. Just unbelievable walking thru there! Like Pere Lachaise without the trees!
Sunset from up there was just spectacular!
Back to the hotel around 9 for a late dinner. Pretty cute place really. Nice pool. Pretty good selection in the buffet. More people here than anywhere we’ve been. I guess it’s the tour routine to head up in the evening and then a late dinner.
Sheets are not nice….very rough. They fixed our sink and replaced all our towels.
Sun June 21
Long bus ride this morning…..4hrs. Seemed to be driving on a plateau. Not a lot to see…..very dry, rolling hills but the Taurus mountains off in the distance were quite spectacular. 2-3000m, some still with snow on the tops. Actually managed to doze off a bit and read my book.
Finally reached Minare, which is the little village below Pinara. We had lunch with a family. They had carpets and pillows all laid out under a trellis that was covered with what looked like wheat (drying it?). A really nice little farm. A cow, a goat or two, a bunch of chickens and lovely vegetable gardens, olive trees and other fruit trees.
The ladies and little girls were prepping lunch in the kitchen and the men were sitting around chatting….Ceylan translated and questions etc.
Lunch was a bunch of dishes that were shared by groups of 4 or 5 of us. Fresh tomatoes with cucumbers and onions in olive oil (homemade), roasted eggplant, green beans in a delicious sauce of some sort, chicken kebabs, fried potatoes kind of like French fries, white beans in sauce, rice and two different kinds of homemade bread (flat and regular) and to top it all off was a delicious cake drizzled with syrup/honey and tea. They showed us how to make tea properly! All excellent and really a lot of fun.
The family seemed to be Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad and 2 very cute little girls. The little girls helped put down the table cloths on the little tables and set out all the plates and cutlery. All the food was very good and the family just lovely. We all thanked them profusely for their wonderful hospitality and delicious food. We could use their bathroom, which was a good thing. The house was immaculately clean and neat and tidy.
A short drive from there to Pinara. Way up and up we went on a very narrow twisty, hairpin filled dirt road. What a beautiful spot! And no one there but us….so even better.
Hiked through the beautiful fragrant forest and some very pretty gullies (no water this time of year), right up to some of the rock tombs. Could actually go inside some of the them. Lots of them! The view was across the valley with the ruins….the theatre is built right into the hillside below and the Taurus mountains in the background…was fantastic.
There are not many restored or put back together ruins there but the site and views were absolutely breathtaking. Very, very hot!!
Luckily just a short bus ride from there to Fetihye. Staying at the Yeniceri Hotel….so far the best yet room wise. Checked in at 4:30. Did some “shower laundry” and read on the deck for a bit before taking a little walk around the area.
Fetihye is a busy place. Quite big with a huge marina…..saw all the gulets! A market and lots of tourists…..this is the start and end point for many of the Lycian coast gulet trips.
Back to the hotel for a quick beer before heading out with our group for the final dinner of this tour. There are 11 of us carrying on to the gulet cruise for this week. I think there are 2 new couples that will be joining us.
Very good restaurant in the main shopping area. Ceylan took us down to the pier to our gulet “Sobek”, named after and Egyptian god.
Even though we’re not tour people, I’m so glad we decided to do this one! There is no way we could have seen all that we did on our own…..no matter how much research we did.
Back to the hotel around 11. Hooray, no wake up call tomorrow…..except maybe the call to prayer of course!
My Travel Journals 