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[ooontheroad-blog]

Bolu/Gölcük

We started our weekend trip by a Metro bus from Ankara. When arrived in Bolu, we had dinner at Özdilek facilities next to the bus station and later took a taxi from there to Garden Termal Otel. Since we didn't have a car, I thought it would be wise staying at somewhere close to Gölcük National Park where we would spend the Saturday. However, the hotel was a big dissapointment with its shabby decoration and the smell inside the room. They said it was the smell of the hot spring coming down to the little pool in the bathroom but it was so unbearable that we had to change the room. The new room was less smelly. This time noise was a bigger problem. There was a wedding at the hotel next to ours. They kept singing and dancing up to midnight. The first thing I did next morning was to check if there was another weeding that night; and when it turned out to be so, we checked out from that hotel. It was nice of them not charging us for that second night which we'd booked already.

We moved to Hampton by Hilton. It was much more better! By noon we took a taxi from hotel to Gölcük. It was quite crowded in the park being on high season and weekend but it was still very nice. We walked around the lake and had lunch at one of restaurants next to it. When we went back to the lake exploring the area for trekking routes, a sudden rain poured down. We took shelter on a bench with a shade, but still got quite wet. We went back to the restaurant when the rain slowed down, tried to dry ourselves and went back for a walk when it properly stopped raining.

There were several trekking routes. We decided on the shortest one. It was 8 km long route with two-coloured signs on trees. There was noone else on the road and at some point we lost trace of the signs. It was still daytime though, and we had the feeling of walking towards the city. So we kept walking across bushes, trees and cow herds; the latter did not seem to be very happy to see us around and we tried to keep away from them! We arrived to a village at the end, and following a little lovely stream found ourselves next to the hotel we spent the first night in! It took us almost 3 hours to get there from Gölcük walking via an extended route.

We took a taxi back to the hotel and after a comfortable sleep there, we left Bolu by noon on Sunday.

July 2018

P.S. Since I'm writing this post after a few weeks, I cannot remember the details about taxi prices, etc.

[ooontheroad-blog]

Selimiye, Turunç, Fethiye

We arrived at Dalaman Airport at 5 pm. The driver of the private car we arranged via www.selimiyetatilrehberi.com was waiting for us at the arrival's exit. The journey took a bit more than 2 hours. When we arrived at Selimiye Swan Lake Boutique Hotel, they offered us green tea at the Odette Restaurant, for which they charged us while checking out! The restaurant turned out not serving dinner and we felt lazy to go down the village, so we went to bed without eating. The hotel was nicely decorated; the room had various lovely details with a door opening into the garden viewing the sea where it was particularly peaceful during night-time under stars. The pool was empty since it was April yet, and they said the water would be very cold. I usually spend long time in hotel bathrooms but I didn't like the smell of water here; also their natural orange and olive oil soap wasn't charming for me and turned my nails into orange..

Next day we set off to explore Selimiye after a rich and delicious breakfast at our hotel, walked through the village down to the sea. It's small village with only two branches of big market chains, doesn't have a pharmacy but has several ATMs. It was a quite village; we could hear roosters and cows occasionally. I didn't notice any architectural particularities. After following the road towards Akkum beach for a while, we wanted to walk on the shore but it turned out to be impossible because of the private properties leaning right on the sea. Then we decided to spend some time at one of the hotels on the beach and stopped by Kıyı Hotel which had swings and hammocks on its garden and loungers on the pebbly beach; and very friendly staff. We stayed there for the rest of the day; had lunch, lied under sun, played backgammon and my companion hired their kayak and went into sea paddling. If I knew about it before, I'd stay at this place instead of Swan Lake Hotel. On our way back we popped in Giritimu Restaurant, owner of which was at our hotel in the morning and so kindly offered to get me some allergy pills from pharmacy in Bozburun. We tried their special helva dessert there, which was a bit heavy but truly delicious. At the end of the day we wanted to walk back to our hotel but we missed the road going up to the hills through the village and I didn't want to take the dark highway where drivers wouldn't expect pedestrians. Without any other option, we had to call the manager of our hotel who came down to pick us up imminently.

Next day the manager of our hotel called a local boatman and we arranged to meet at 2 pm for a private tour. While waiting for the tour, we walked to Akkum beach which to our surprise was a sandy public beach with no visible showers or loungers. After walking in the shallow waters of the bay for a while, we went back to marina and met with the old boatsman who'd take us for a tour. It was a small boat and we visited several nearby villages stopping to swim occasionally. The tour took 3 hours and 300 Turkish Liras. We were planning to go to Bozburun after the boat tour and the boatman offered us a ride with his car but seemed to forget about his offer when we were back to Selimiye so we took public minibus for our journey, which turned out to be not an easy task because despite the central position of bus station (across the mosque) no one knew about its schedule. Waiting desperately under sun for a while, we managed to catch one. When we arrived at Bozburun we were already tired and just had a little walk in the central town and had dinner at a sea-side restaurant. My companion tried their octopus salad and liked it.

Next day was our departure day and we decided to head to Turunç as suggested by the hotel staff. We took the first minibus to Marmaris Otogar after breakfast and again first minibus to Turunç from there. It took us only half an hour to get there and I fell in love with Turunç!

Turunç is a small, pristine town surrounded by mountains. The sea is clear; the beach is not sandy but pebbly again. When we arrived there it turned out that most of the hotels –which seemed to be available online- were not open yet and the town was mostly catering to daily tourists from Marmaris. We asked at least 5 accommodation facilities until a shop owner took us to Meva Hotel which was being painted by its owners at that moment. They said they could clean a room and get it ready for us in minutes. Since we didn’t want to lose any more hours of our single day in Turunç, we decided to stay there. After quickly changed in a dusty room, we headed to the beach. We had lunch at Körfez Restaurant and rested on their loungers for a few hours. Then my companion –who is in love with boat trips- wanted to see if it would be possible to go for a short boat ride and we sailed by the boat of Hüseyin Captain. It was an hour long trip with one stop for swimming. Hüseyin Captain was a nice man who is married to an English lady with kids. Later we found out that the marriages between English and Turkish citizens were very common in the town. Returning back to the town at about sunset, we went to the motel, changed in the room which was prepared for us and went for a walk in the town, and dined at Körfez Restaurant again. Meva Hotel was a nice, budget hotel (only 100 TL) but we were cold in the night with the thin summer covers. Next day we had breakfast the Green Garden, an English restaurant. Although I could have stayed in Turunç for weeks, we took a boat taxi to Marmaris for 100 TL –because of my companion’s boat addiction- and continued to Fethiye for the rest of our holiday as we planned.

We took a dolmuş to Marmaris Otogar from the pier and another dolmuş to Fethiye from the otogar. The dolmuş ride to Fethiye took almost 2 hours with lots of stops on the road, on-and-offs of air-conditioning and conversations and arguments of the driver with the local passengers making it an even longer and more exhaustive journey than we expected. We booked Hotel Unique on our way to Fethiye and got there by taxi from Fethiye Otogar. We were met by smell of a flower mixture right at the gate of the hotel. Hotel Unique was truly fascinating with its detailed decoration merging the nature with the building and the infinity pool. It was an adults-only hotel and quite expensive but still well-worth the price. That evening we walked through Aşıklar Tepesi and Amintas Rock Tombs; unsuccessfully tried to get to Paspatur, finally dined at LemonH2O Bistro. We ended the day by watching Champions League semi-final (Liverpool-Roma) at a sea-side café which was not full of English people to my surprise!

The destination of the 5th day of our holiday was Ölüdeniz. First we booked a 12 Islands Boat Trip for the next day and then took a dolmuş from Fethiye Otogar to Ölüdeniz and once we were there my companion rushed to book a canoe –another love of his- and we found ourselves changing into our swimming suits at the back of an office and on the canoe in a few minutes. Since I cannot swim well, I wore a life jacket and sat there for almost two hours under direct light of noon-sun in the most uncomfortable position! When we were back I was tired –although didn’t move a finger-, hungry and in a nasty temper. We had lunch at one of the cafes on the beach where despite the good food, the service was too slow. I don’t know how but we decided to go for paragliding –I might have suggested doing that!- after lunch and booked our places at the same agency we booked the canoe. While the canoe costed 150 TL for 3 hours, the paragliding costed 350 TL per person and an extra 100 TL each if we wanted to receive the photos taken throughout the journey. I still think that 100 TL was way too expensive to transfer photos from a computer to our phones; they didn’t even provide a USB stick! We climbed 1200 metres with a minibus and joined the chaotic group of paragliding trainees and customers up on the mountain after a rough drive. I already regretted going up there but was caught between a nasty drive down the hills or a scary jump to the sea! I decided to go with the flow, did not resist when they tied me to the pilot or asked me to walk a few steps forward and yes, we were flying! I didn’t scream but was terribly scared and held the ropes tight. The pilot made me hold the camera stick and tried to relax me but his talking and insisting made me cry rather than relax. Still he didn’t quit and asked if I wanted him to sing a song. He had a certain accent and when I learned his hometown, I wanted him to sing me a Kurdish song. It was the best part of the whole experience; however, we were so lost in it that we didn’t think about recording it. When we were back on the land after half an hour in the sky, I was full of mixed emotions crying and laughing at the same time. It was such a spontaneous day that we noticed we didn’t visit Blue Lagoon –which gives its name to the area- until we saw it from air. However, we were too tired to walk there on the beach again so we took a taxi to Çalış Beach and dined and ended the day there.

12 Islands Boat Trip started about 10 a.m. in the morning. We were together with honeymoon couples, Turkish-American ladies with their daughters and a Turkish-Egyptian couple with their little boy. When we took off the captain turned on the music but I objected that since we were told it would be a quiet trip. The captain didn’t insist and we had a relaxing day on the boat sunbathing, swimming at beautiful bays, reading and snacking. We were back to the land by 4.30 p.m. and hurried to take a taxi to walk around Kayaköy before sunset. The taxi driver was a friendly man; he took us to Kayaköy and said to call him back when we were finished to take us back to Fethiye. Kayaköy was the most fascinating experience in Fethiye. Ghost village, as it is called, was grabbed by the nature and quiet. We walked up and down for about 2 hours on the paths abandoned first by the Greek, then by the Turks. It was interesting that the area was not reconstructed as a holiday resort but left on its own. We dined at İzela Restaurant down in the village, which was a very refined place with an indoor fireplace and outdoor pool. The taxi driver who took us to Kayaköy took us back to Fethiye. We agreed to pay him 600 TL on the next day for a tour of Saklıkent, ancient sites, Karadere beach and airport transfer.

We visited ancient city of Tlos first on our last day. I do not like being in the open fields under direct sun light, so I didn’t stay there long. Our second stop was Saklıkent Gorge. It had a gorgeous landscape with a gushing river. After a short manmade path, we rented rubber shoes and began our rough walk in the river. The water was freezing; the tiny rocks pricked our feet. We aimed for 3 kilometres but could walk only 1 kilometre (in total) in 2 hours. It was an amazing and also exhaustive experience. The gorge was not very crowded, but they say it is usually packed during high-season when people go there to enjoy cool weather. The taxi driver took us to Karadere Beach for lunch but he got lost on his way and we could have lunch only at 4 p.m.! Karadere Beach was not a highly touristic area and didn’t have any public/private loungers or umbrellas. There was only one facility which offered food, drinks, bungalows and shower and toilets for the visitors and campers. My companion walked for a considerable distance until the sea reached his belly. Although not very touristic, the beach was not unknown to the local people who didn’t hesitate driving their cars on the sands. We were supposed to visit ancient sites of Xhantos-Letoon and pick local tomatoes at a greenhouse known by the taxi driver but being exhausted and late –due to the time lost looking for Karadere-, we preferred to go back to airport. Although the taxi driver was a friendly, easy-going man, I don’t think that the trip was worth the money we paid.

In a nutshell, my favourites of this holiday were Kıyı Hotel/Selimiye, Turunç, Kayaköy/Fethiye.

April 2018

[ooontheroad-blog]

Cappadocia

We set off from Ankara on Friday afternoon by a Kamil Koç bus. Although we bought the tickets from Ankara to Göreme, the bus didn’t go to Göreme but a shuttle bus took us there from Nevşehir. The journey took 5.5 hour which is at least one hour longer than it should have been. Later the manager of our hotel told us that there are express buses by Nevşehir Seyahat from Ankara. Next time we’ll try that.

We had our (latish) dinner at Topdeck Restaurant. We ordered a small meze plate and a lamb shank; they served complimentary sütlaç after the meal. The food was delicious; the restaurant was authentic and cosy. The staff was fluent in English.

We stayed at Tekkaya Cave Hotel. We enjoyed our stay in the cave room decorated with wooden objects and local carpets. The only misfortune was the chilly weather during the night despite it was already June. I was cold while sleeping on our first night but the manager kindly provided an extra duvet for the second night.

On Saturday, our first stop was Göreme Open Air Museum where we spent around 2 hours in and out of churches carved into mountains. Most of the frescos were still intact and quite fascinating. Photoshoot was not allowed in the churches even without flash, which did not make sense to us. We thought perhaps it was banned not only to preserve the paintings but also the mystery of the area for future visitors. The Museum has one the best museum shops I have ever seen in Turkey with a wide range of products and helpful staff.

We walked back to the central Göreme for lunch and ate at Jiao Zi Queen Chinese Restaurant. The food was good but it was difficult to communicate the Asian staff who did not speak English or Turkish!

We went back to the Landscape Travel Agency for the quadbike ride we booked in the morning on our way to Göreme Open Air Museum. The man in the office took us to the parking spot by an automobile and filled the back row with four passengers one on the top of the other! When we arrived at the parking spot they handed us helmets but said they were out of bonnets. I didn’t feel very enthusiastic to wear the dingy helmet without a bonnet! They gave me a bonnet secretly saying that was the last one they had. They didn’t ask for any kind of licence or didn’t check IDs for the age of the drivers. They gave a quick introduction about how to use the quadbike and we set off with about 30 other people. I don’t know how to drive a car and although this is not a proper car, I wouldn’t have dared to drive it if my companion was not driving. The journey lasted about 2.5 hours with 15 minutes breaks at Göreme Panorama, Çavuşin and Rose Valley; and costed 150 TL. It was my first time on a quadbike, so the experience was interesting but I neither liked the attitude of the staff or the noise of the bike. And it was not easy to connect with the nature on a quadbike. I think if I ever do it again it will be for the fun of driving itself, not to explore an area.

At the end of the day we ate the Indian food cooked by the Indian chef of our hotel. The food was delicious and abundant. It costed 75 TL excluding the drinks.

The final day of our weekend getaway started at 9.30 a.m.. We wanted to see Ihlara Valley and the manager of our hotel arranged us a Green Tour which covers visits to an underground city, an open air cathedral, lunch and Ihlara Valley. The minibus of the Gorgeous Turkey Tours Travel Agency took us from the hotel. We were together with visitors from USA, Korea, Philippine, Jordan and Italia. The guide, Azad Arpaci, was very friendly and professional and the tour was well-organized. It costed 35 Euros each covering the guided tour, museum tickets and lunch –excluding drinks-. The first stop of the tour was Derinkuyu Underground City. After going down for 7 storeys and learning about the history, construction methods, social order, chimneys/sliding doors and ventilation systems of this shelter city we came up again and got going for the next stop, Selime Cathedral. A grandiose structure carved into mountain, Selime Cathedral has served as a church, a cathedral, a caravansary and now a museum. After a short ride we arrived at the lunch place next to Melendiz River. The restaurant set the tables for the tour groups beforehand and the passengers of our minibus took their places around a long table to eat the dishes they chose while on the road. The food was delicious, nicely served and again well-organized without any chaos.  We rode to Ihlara Valley after lunch and after visiting Ağaçlı Church and finally taking some photos of 9th-11th century frescos, we walked about 3 kilometres by the river. The valley was deep, covered with the shades of various trees and plants and had a delightful breeze adding to the joy of hike.

There were 2 more stops of the tour which we couldn’t take because of the timing of our bus back to Ankara. Our guide kindly arranged a car to take us to Göreme Otogar where we took Kamil Koç shuttle to Nevşehir Otogar and after another unexpectedly long journey (6 hours) returned home.

In a nutshell, my favourites of this trip were Topdeck Restaurant and Ihlara Valley.

May 2018