Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Showing posts with label turkey. Show all posts
Best European Holiday Destinations: Antalya
If you are travelling to the beautiful Turkish city of Antalya or indeed any of the stunning g scenery that can be found in the surrounding coastal region of the country then you will most likely want to arrive via the nearby airport. Turkey has some of the most unique and naturally beautiful coastal and mountainous scenery in the world, so taking a holiday or backpacking trip to Antalya is best enjoyed if you allow yourself to explore beyond the confines of the city itself.
If you tire of the great attractions of Antalya such as the city walls and Hıdırlık Tower, as well as the numerous bars, shops and places to eat in the historically rich Kaleiçi area of the city, then why not look further affield and take advantage of car hire Antalya airport and take the chance to investigate the towering mountains and cliffs that surround the city. There are also the fantastic nearby Konyaaltı, Lara and Karpuzkaldıran beaches that are well worth a visit for travelers and visitors to Turkey. In order to get around the region more easily visitors can take advantage of cheap car hire Turkey and get around at their own leisure and speed.
Enjoy the Beautiful Natural Coastline of Dalaman, Turkey
If you are looking for a holiday destination in Europe that offers visitors a variety of great natural landscapes including truly beautiful natural coastline and warm temperate waters, then there are surely fewer places better to take a vacation than Dalaman in Turkey. This area which is to be found in the South West of the country is sandwiched between the mountainous areas and the beautiful ocean and has great beaches and coastal views in natural abundance, and for this reason proves a great draw for tourists around the world. The area is also popular for its sporting facilities and archaeological sites which are of some interest to tourists.
If you want to explore the coast further and without restriction why not take advantage of the widely available car hire Dalaman Airport? Whether you choose to stay in the more upmarket hotel accommodation or prefer to save money and enjoy the great outdoors by camping out under the stars in the back drop of this picturesque natural coastline, you’re sure to want to take advantage of cheap car hire Turkey to make the most of your visit to this region.
Our latest travel writing: in print and online
As I don't have time to blog at the moment (read why here), feel free to check out our latest writing in print and online. This month in J Mag, Jazeera Airways' in-flight magazine, you can read about walking tours with shepherds, learning to make traditional bread with a village baker, and some of the other rustic activities being offered by Northern Cyprus' first eco-village in our story 'Village People' (online version here). The same issue also features 'Where to Stay: Antalya', my overview of the best hotels in one of Turkey's most agreeable cities. We spent just over two and a half months in Turkey last year writing, including six weeks in Antalya last year renting an apartment in a restored Ottoman house in the old city. The Northern Cyprus story was researched during a trip to Cyprus (we flew to Antalya from Northern Cyprus) to update a few books and write a first edition Cyprus guide for AA Publishing. Online, you can take a look at our piece on Adelaide: Australia's most underrated city, on Viator, which is one of our final posts on a series we wrote while Down Under working on books and stories: see the full series here. The pic? That's the idyllic setting for the walks with the local shepherd that we write about in the Northern Cyprus story. Tempted?
Antalya, Turkey: silhouettes and beers at sunset
I can't get enough of the sunsets in Antalya. Early evening, an hour or so before the sun goes down, we wander down to the old harbour, a ten minute walk from the house we're renting. During the day Terry and I are so focused on work, that apart from our coffee and lunch breaks, our bend-and-stretch moments, and our breaks to play with the kittens (when we arrived four weeks ago we were asked to babysit a cat and her four newborn kittens; the offer was too good to refuse), we rarely speak and our eyes barely leave our laptop screens. Once upon a time when I worked a full-time job my staff used to call me a robot. Now I freelance I'm the same. Terry's no different. We could be working in separate offices, for separate companies. It's like this when we're in write-up mode. So we use our walks to catch up on the day's 'events'. We ignore the touts wanting to sell us carpets, postcards and tacky souvenirs. Especially the guy in the fez who is always posing for a picture with sunburnt German tourists. And we ignore the guys inviting us to sit down in their restaurants for dinner (at 6pm!), to have a beer, to take a boat tour. And we especially ignore the guys in silly velvet costumes yelling out "Hello! Ice-cream!". Today we look at each other and laugh. It sounds as if they're saying hello to their ice creams. Do these calls ever get people in? Is it not enough to display the ice-cream and for tourists to see it and think "Mmm... ice-cream... that looks good, I might have an ice cream..." Do we need to be shouted at? The touts in Turkey are bugging us more than ever before. They should know we're 'locals' by now, I think. Terry and I use our walks to brief each other on emails received, work opportunities and offers, commissions underway, progress made in trip planning, and new project ideas. We always seem to have new project ideas. This is part of our problem. We're never satisfied. We always want more. We take on too much. And we chat about the travel news and world news and emails from family and friends. And then we enjoy the sunset. With the locals. Who walk along the concrete breakwater and back again. Who canoodle on the rocks. Play with their kids. Read newspapers. Paint their boats. Fix their fishing nets. Buy hot nuts. Eat hot nuts. Play guitar. Drink beers. They always drink beers. They really seem to like their beer here, especially the local brand Efes. Once the sun is so low that the people are only silhouettes, we snap a few pics and go 'home'. Back to work. And then I'm reminded that no matter how much we're living like locals, we're not locals. If we were locals, we'd still be down at the harbour drinking beers.
Living like locals
Two months ago we arrived in Antalya, Turkey, from Crete via Northern Cyprus. We weren't in Turkey to research or write about Turkey. We were here to hole up at our friends' villa in Kas and use it as a base for a month to write up the Crete and Cyprus books, write a tonne of travel stories for magazines, and plan our next trips. When it was time to leave Kas, we still had more to do, and more work had come in, so we returned to Antalya and rented an apartment for another month. It's a rooftop apartment in a renovated Ottoman house in the old town and we've been here writing, and living like locals. In some ways, it's a relief to not have the pressure of being a parachute artist. We've had no personal desire to play the traveller either, as we've been here before. So we haven't done anything touristy in our time here. In fact we've eaten out just a couple of times. After two months on the road in Cyprus and Crete, moving hotels every couple of days and eating all our meals in restaurants (and with another few months of the same ahead of us), all we wanted to do was eat at 'home'. We've still gotten to know the city. Just a different side of the city to the average traveller. We know every supermarket in town, and which one to head to for what products. We know the different words for lamb and beef in Turkish, and while our vocabulary reads like a shopping list, we know little more than the usual greetings and courtesies. Yet we've somehow built up a rapport with our butcher, who when he sees us looks pleased and smiles. And he seems pleased that we like him to prepare our lamb cutlets the Turkish way, beaten flat and tender and smothered in spices. We know all the courier companies as we've been sending and receiving contracts and manuscripts between here and London, with varying degrees of success. Let's just say that we know the Kaleici (Old Town) streets better than the couriers. We know Antalya is a college town although you rarely read that anywhere. It has a lively, youthful scene, and these kids, especially the arts students (the ones carrying the sketch pads) have the coolest haircuts we've ever seen, so cool they'd be right at home in Milan. We know where the locals go for their afternoon walks. In the seaside neighborhoods just outside the tourist area. And that in the early evening they like to take beers and food they bring from home and set up picnics on the wooden tables overlooking the water. In the same park young couples canoodle on the benches, parents play with their kids, and a lonely man stares at the sea. We see the man around town. He's missing part of one leg, from the knee down, and he moves about on crutches, balancing a stand hung with fluffy toys and Valentines hearts which he sells to earn his living. He usually wears a camouflage jacket although the other day he was wearing a clean new shirt. And he has tea in another park some days, staring at the sea. We may not know the tourist sights, but each day we're seeing little things that move us more than any museum display. Things most travellers wouldn't notice as they rush through a destination in a few days.
The rising interest in four-wheeled holiday pleasure in Turkey: motorhome tourists rule!
Motorhome tourists get haircuts at the local barber, shop at local markets and buy more souvenirs from the places they go to see: "They never want to stay in just one place, and unlike the tourists taking advantage of the cheap ‘everything included’ system we see in many of our hotels, they don’t only stay a short time and then return to their countries,” Bulent Karaboncuk, the head of the Turkey Camping and Motor Home Association, said in ‘Four-wheeled holiday pleasure around Turkey’s hidden treasures’ in Sunday’s Zaman. Karaboncuk is campaigning to convince his compatriots to develop motorhome tourism in Turkey, a country that so far only has 20 campsites, by promoting the benefits to the local community: “People who come to tour a country with their motor homes tend to stay longer than other kinds of tourists and tend to mix more with the people of the country they are visiting,” he says. Karaboncuk is also trying to persuade Turks to buy a motorhome rather than a summer house in a coastal development, a growing trend among Turks as much as foreigners: “A holiday in a motor home is actually a way of life. European citizens actually spend their entire holiday in their motor homes… in the summer, the roads are full of motor homes.” However, Karaboncuk says, he’s meeting some resistance: “Unfortunately… we seem to be blind to the importance of this kind of tourism and have set up all sorts of blockades to it.” Onur Onurmen of Can Karavan is resorting to the promotion of creature comforts to increase motorhome sales: “Mobile homes offer the possibility of unlimited comforts in a smaller environment… we are seeing things like plasma televisions and satellite systems in motor homes these days,” Like the rest of the world, it seems in Turkey the comforts of home are important to people, no matter where they are.
Cool camping: creature comforts, clever marketing and celebrity campers
A Mongolian yurt, luxury tented cabin, wooden wigwam, or plain old pup tent... wherever you choose to roll out your sleeping bag know that (just like caravanning), camping is cool. Or so the media has been insisting for a while now. More Brits were taking their tents to the country than ever before, BBC News told us in April 2006, raising the question “So how did camping become cool?” in ‘Why the British Carry on Camping’: “Boy scouts, hippies and soggy tents… camping used to have an image problem”, but not anymore. Thanks to celebrity campers Kate Moss, Jodie Kidd and Sienna Miller taking an interest in pitching tents (sound familiar?), along with chic camping gear to show off - “Ted Baker blow-up mattresses, Cath Kidston sleeping bags or Mongolian-style yurts” – camping became “more palatable” to those who loved the idea of the great outdoors but didn’t want to give up their creature comforts. While Cool Camping series author Jonathan Knight admitted top designers introduced camping to a new audience by bringing a sense of style to the experience, he said there was more to the trend: "The designers made it cool but the popularity is because more and more people are living in towns and cities, many without a garden or outdoor space, and camping offers them an antidote to urban life." (As one happy camper in the story said: "You can gather round a campfire with smoke in our faces and there's something very relaxing about that.") Also that month in an article called ‘Cool Camping’ The Observer claimed camping had come a long way since “the dank ages”: “Pull up the tent pegs of history and pack away memories of soggy childhood camping trips,” Rhiannon Batten wrote, “Nowadays, staying under canvas is less about smelly sleeping bags and dank communal toilet blocks and more about thread-counted sheets and tents that come with private showers… Pitch up at the right spot and you'll find facilities designed with an altogether new breed of camper in mind - one who likes the idea of getting back to basics just so long as it involves the comfort of a Cath Kidston sleeping bag, Ted Baker blow-up mattress or even a kingsize bed and a duck-down duvet. Welcome to cool camping.” (Haven't we read this somewhere before?) The writer then gave us a rundown of cool camping options: Kenyan safari-style lodges, Maharaja-type hunting tents, yoga-camps in Turkey, hi-tech Alpine eco-pods in Switzerland, and – the "ultimate in bohemian chic" – Mongolian yurts in Cornwall. What has me wondering is not which was cool first, camping or caravanning, but who sent out the press release? Jonathon Knight? Or was it Cath Kidston or Ted Baker? Whoever it was, at least they got everyone outdoors.The photo? Oh, that old thing, that's... um... our luxury 'tent' at the Four Seasons Tented Camp at the Golden Triangle.
** I've been wondering how many people actually live and travel in yurts, other than Mongolians of course... and the people over at TrekHound have only sparked my curiosity further with their extraordinary compilation of research on yurts. Check this out! Very impressive.
Places You Must Go This Spring: part 1
It's time to get out and smell the wildflowers! Pack your walking boots, grab your picnic basket, get on a plane, and prepare to drive through breathtaking scenery. See my previous post for the criteria for selecting these sublime spring destinations:1) CRETE – the isolated eastern coast is dotted with tiny seaside communities of summer cottages peeling with paint and pristine sandy beaches; behind them colossal mountains cradle lush, fertile farming plateaus with quaint stone villages. In March the area is dotted with flowers, but in April there's an explosion of colour here and also on the equally isolated and mountainous western coast.
2) MAINLAND GREECE – the deep blue Prespa lakes and sleep fishing village of Psarádes near the Macedonian and Albanian borders, Meteora with its magical mountain-top monasteries (pictured), the magnificent Pindos Mountains and Zagoria villages where traditional grey stone houses cling to the hillside, the Pelopponese with its remote Mani, fertile Arcadia and wild Sparta, the dramatic Parnonas Mountains, and because I can't resist including one island, fragrant Corfu. For more ideas, see our Greece trip journal written during a Spring 2006 research trip for Lonely Planet.
3) TURKEY - all along the Mediterranean you'll find flowers blooming everywhere, especially in the countryside surrounding the beachside villages of Olimpos, Patara and Cirali, around the tomato-growing town of Kumluova, and in the woods around the ruins of Kaya. On a Sunday you'll frequently see empty cars parked on the side of the road - their owners, families of locals can be seen picking flowers in the fields or picnicking in the forests. You'd be wise to follow their example.
Spring is here!
We wind down the windows of our car and breathe in the fresh air - it's fragrant! Floral scents mingle with pine and eucalyptus. Wildflowers carpet the countryside. Butterflies are fluttering about. Turtles cross the road (don't ask me why). Trees that were bare and lifeless a week ago have come to life and are sprouting green leaves. The weather is all of a sudden warmer. It must be spring! We really noticed the change in season today on our drive from Kas on the Mediterranean coast of Turkey, where we're holing up at a friend's house to write for a while, to Antalya. So it seems timely to create a list of destinations you must visit this (northern hemisphere) spring. Let's see.. my main criteria? The scenery must be spellbinding in its natural beauty, the air must be aromatic, at every turn you need to come across animals grazing on the new grass, and there must be an explosion of colour in the countryside, with fields suddenly flush with wildflowers. I'm on to it!
Travelling: connections #1
As much as I love the incongruities we come across on our movements around the globe, I love making connections between cultures and finding similarities in everyday encounters. It's all about joining the dots. The Beijing Turkish kebap boys reminded me of two affable cooks we'd met two weeks earlier at Hong Kong Noodle on Sampeng Lane, Bangkok. Fantastic noodles, authentic, tasty, cheap. And friendly staff. That visit wasn't memorable because of the incongruity of that experience - after all, the Chinese have a connection to Bangkok. Ankara and Beijing may be boosting ties now but I don't know of any historical Chinese-Turkish connections. Regardless, this is more about making connections between experiences in different parts of the world, in our minds, in our memories. An image, a moment, an event, one reminds us of another. It's all about connecting the dots, don't you think?