"Let's do less and leave some in reserve"

I read this in another blog I enjoy by Leo Babauta, Zen Habits. It goes hand in hand with another of my Travel Rules, You can't see everything, so don't try. As Leo says, about life and travel, in particular,

"When you travel, don't try to see everything. See a few things and take your time. Leave the destination knowing there is more to see that you're leaving for next time. Leave yourself wanting more." I couldn't agree more. I have often counseled friends to cut out some travel destinations and spend more time in fewer places. I can say from experience that you don't remember as much if you race from city to city, trying to cram it all in. The places we remember most are the ones where we have stayed a little longer and really settled in, sometimes by choice, and sometimes by necessity. We knew that we weren't going to drive the entire turquoise coast, nor did we want to push ourselves to drive too far. 

That being said, we have a lot of ground to cover here, so make a cup of tea and enjoy the view.

Just to refresh your memory, we stopped in Fethiye for the night, then headed toward Marmaris on our way to Datca. The road wasn't especially pretty after we left the coast, but there was always something interesting to see. Marmaris is a big, not very beautiful coastal city from what we could see.  And on a Saturday morning, most things seemed to be closed, or maybe not yet open for the tourist season? 

So we continued down the looong road down the hill to the peninsula. We decided to take the yellow road , indicated by stars, to see some ruins.We actually never found the ruins, but instead we drove along some beautiful turquoise bays, any one if which I would have been happy to stay at overnight, but accommodations at this time of the year were few and far between. We did stop at a little market, and I was beginning to realize that every market sold the same basic veggies and fruit, plus some nuts , dried fruits ,and of course, Turkish delight. 

Jim is a good sport about going down these little winding ,unimproved roads- to a point. Then we have to agree to get back to the main road again and focus on our destination. And that destination was Datca. When we finally strived, it was a little bit jarring to both of us to see this white, very modern city that appeared to have been built yesterday! Maybe that wasn't quite what I envisioned, but my requirements for the night were 1) a view of the water, 2) heat, 3) wifi. They were all met by the beautiful 

Kumluca hotel, so I was satisfied. And jim was happy to stop driving early in the day. 

The only thing that marred our view was the two navy ships anchored in the bay.. I had thought to mention this to the captain when we saw him come by our restaurant, but decided against it. It was pretty perfect, and at night they had lights strung on the ships. 

You might think we'd be happy to sit and enjoy the view, but it was still a bit windy, and we had some ruins to discover at the end of the road...

Those roads I mentioned are small and narrow- usually little more than a donkey path. Afterall, there were no cars back then. So we drove, and drove, and asked directions 3 times to Karakoy. We really had no sense if how far it was, and we were running a bit low on fuel.

At various times we were both about ready to give up and turn around,when finally we saw a sign saying 8 kilometers to Karakoy. Jim threw up his hands but I encouraged him to go further-- haha, that is the story of our life! Well, we each encouraged the other until finally we saw a ticket booth. 

This was an impressive city even now, set between two harbors. They really knew how to pick the best locations! 

Of course there was an amphitheater, facing out to sea.

And row upon row of broken stones.

They know this was a very wealthy trading center and believe it was eventually abandoned because of a series of powerful earthquakes. 

I found even these piles of stones thrilling to see, and the photos cannot adequately convey the stunning setting of this city. It was well worth the long and sometimes scary drive to the end of the road.

This prompted us to come up with another travel rule Sometimes the best things lie at the end of the road. Luckily we are both the kind of people who like to see what is at the end of the road! 

After a sound sleep we had another typical breakfast in the Land of Milk and Honey.

Sitting on the patio in the sun- finally no wind! 

On the road back, we stopped at a beautiful camp ground and picnic spot. People were just arriving with their picnic things, which consisted of big bags full of loaves of bread, gallons of water for tea, and some kind of stove to heat the water.

I would happily camp here for a few days.

We had a lunch date in Mugla however so we continued along the road. Mugla turned out to have a charming older center, which we found just by chance. That was where the old Turkish men hung out chatting and drinking tea. 

I saw someone selling these and asked jim to stop so I could investigate . The kind owner gave me these for free! They are little doughnuty things lightly sweetened with honey, called Loukma. Yum.

A door I'd like to go through...

The cool cobblestone courtyard..

Quaint Ottoman era buildings

And a wonderful little door that I told Jim to go through, to which he replied" I'm not going through that door!" 

Haha! It just led to the courtyard, which I could see. Isn't he a good sport, though? 

On our way out of town we came upon a big market, which I just had to visit.

And there we saw the little stoves that the picnickers carried that morning. I want one! 

I would have bought some of her hyacinths if I didn't already have some.

From Kas to Fethiye

We had more ground to cover and more ruins to discover before we stopped for the night, and the road was long and winding. Seldom was there a place to pull off to gaze at the view, but there was one 

Spot where there was a beautiful beach and we had to look. Jim is contemplating if it would be worth climbing down all the stairs to get to the beach. The answer was no.

Beautiful as it was, it was still windy, and those steps would require a full day at the beach!

Jim and the sheep are reading the history of Patara, another ancient city. 

This was a " drive by ruin", where it was easily visible from the road, and it was pretty impressive.

I may be getting my ancient cities mixed up at this point, but it think this is Xanthos...they almost all have well preserved amphitheaters, some cities even more than one. That speaks well of the classical world, doesn't it? 

I wish we had enough time to spend a leisurely afternoon climbing around each city, but we still had to find a place to stay for the night. So on we went, toward Fetiyeh.

Luckily we found a nice "apart hotel", a common accommodation in resort towns. More like a small apartment, with a kitchenette and a nice patio which would be lovely in the summertime. Too bad it was so chilly.

Of course it wouldn't have been so cold if we had figured out that the air conditioner was also a heater! 

Luckily we found a nice restaurant facing the sea with a view of sunset. It was just us and the Brits, who were having a lot more fun ( and beers ) than we were! 

Another virtually abandoned coastal town, waiting for the summer visitors. It can feel a little weird to be among the few tourists around, but it is also nice to have our pick of hotels at bargain prices. 

And down the road some more...

II am determined to show more of the turquoise coast of Turkey before I am finished with this part of the  country. There were more surprises along the road- in fact at every turning. The next surprise was the Noel Baba museum, or as my brochure called it, the Santa Claus museum. It sounded kinda kitschy, and we just happened to see a sign for the turnoff, so we thought we'd take a look. 

Turns out that it was the church of St Nicholas, patron saint of children and seamen! Here he looks a bit like Father Christmas , no? Say Santa Claus fast, and it sounds a lot like St Nickolas, doesn't it? That was an aha moment for us! His church was cool, too, with some well preserved floor tiles and interior frescoes. 

Such intricate mosaic work on floors..

The well preserved church

Wall paintings

We bought our postcards( though I swore I was never going to buy more postcards after all I have given away! ) and hit the road, after an educational side trip to see the origins of Santa Claus. We hit it just right, as the buses full of tour groups were just arriving as we left. I'm sure it is an important stop on any religious tour. 

It was now only 11 in the morning, so we still had time to find a nice place for lunch farther down the road. Of course I found an alternate route that took us up into the mountains, past old stone houses and scenic vistas.

And every little village has a mosque.

Finally we found our way back to the sea, and Kas, in time for a late lunch. You could tell that in high season this would be a prime vacation spot, but the winds were wipping up whitecaps and it was still chilly. Workers were readying the resorts for the tourist onslaught that begins around Easter. 

We were the only diners here, and possibly the only tourists in town! But we had a nice lunch in the seclusion of this garden.

Any messages? 

A delicious beef stew served on a bed of eggplant purée, and a big fresh salad of arugula and chopped vegetables.

A llast look at the harbor before hittin the road again.

Down the road

I had wanted to see the turquoise coast of Turkey for many years, even before our last trip over ten years ago. It is famed for thescenery and  beautiful blue waters ( hence the name) and Jim and I have looked into taking one of the " blue cruises" on sailboats along the very coast we were driving on. 

Of course driving gives one a very different viewpoint than you would get from the water,  but we could also cover a lot more ground in a week with our car. Plus, it is fun to have your own set of wheels and go wherever you want! 

I have included a map of the area, so you know where we are.

What I didn't realize was how many fabulous ruins lay along this coastline, tucked back, often on very small roads away from the main highway. Each of the yellow places on the map were once ancient cities.

Phaselis was our first such site-the perfect combination of being cool, and close to the highway! 

Eventually we figured out that these sites were denoted by a brown highway sign. But that took us a while...and most sites had a gate where they charged an admission fee that varied from site to site.

We were excited to find a small city set amid pines between two peaceful harbors. I could have stayed there for a week.

I find it thrilling to be able to walk along these roads and see the remains of shops, baths and market places and try to imagine it as it once was, humming with day to day life.

And I marvel at these intricately carved stones that must have been so beautiful when they were new, but have a real charm still with the patina of age. We still see the egg and dart pattern used, I fact it is a motif in my hotel room in modern day Istanbul. 

The harbor...but we can't linger too long. We have so much more to see! We had to bypass Olimpos and Chimera, unfortunately, as the hours were getting short and we needed to find a stopping place for the night. 

As we came down the steep hill into Kumluca, we saw miles of plastic greenhouses on the valley floor and soon realized that all those tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and eggplant served throughout  Turkey  were grown right there, in the vegetable basket of Kumluca.

We made a decision to stop and try to book a hotel, and found several nice loking places, but they were 23 kilometers back in the direction we had come from, but on a different road. The view from the rooms was so enticing that we made a reservation, then tried to use our gps to find it. After a while, the directions sort of petered out, though, and we were on our own. So that meant asking directions from the locals. Easier said than done in a very small, rural setting. Oh, we asked directions all right, from everyone to the police( jandarma), local farmers and shopkeepers, and everyone gave us directions- in Turkish, of course. After being sent one way then another and driving in a complete circle for an hour, we were about ready to give up when we finally asked a young woman and she gave us such confident directions that we eventually found the right road! Whew. We arrived just in time to enjoy sunset from the terrace.

That building in the foreground was where we ate a simple dinner of sea bream that night as the stars came out.

These are our Turkish slippers provided for us by our hostess . Everyone wears them! 

We ate breakfast on the patio outside, as we inhaled the sweet scent of orange blossoms. Most of the products were from her own garden. Olives from her trees, honey from the bees and orange marmalade made by hand. She was very proud of it all. 

This was her mother, dressed in the traditional style that nearly all of the older women dressed like, and you could find these very wide pants for sale in the market. I did not buy any no matter how comfortable they looked. They would definitely not play well in Portland.

I saw these strings of orange peels in the market too, and wasn't sure what they were used for, then realized later that they were for making the syrupy orange preserves. 

We were happy we found the place and happy to be getting on the road again. An hour down the road, however, we got a call from her telling us we left a charger behind... Not goin back.