I got back last night from a couple of days in Kalkan. My sister and brother-in-law have had a two-week holiday there and I went to visit them and have a little break.
Kalkan is a very pretty town about an hour’s drive from Fethiye. It is on the coast and built on the side of a mountain so the view when you come over the last hill is really spectacular. The view from their hotel – situated quite high up the slope – was also breath-taking.
 |
| a pool with a view |
The town itself is clustered around the harbour, but there has been lots of building in the last few years so there are many villas spread over the hill. They are not all attractive and in some ways it would be nice if it could have remained how it was but nothing can spoil the quaintness of the centre of the town with its old houses crowded onto steep streets and the stunning blue of the bay, interrupted by a couple of islands.
There are many lovely restaurants there and the nicest places to eat are on some of the roof terraces so you make the most of the views. While the menus are a bit more varied and adventurous than most of the restaurants in Çalış, prices are also significantly higher. Even the shops cater for bigger spenders. There is a bag shop selling very exact copies of designer bags which they have made by a factory in İstanbul – the average price being about 300TL. The copy watches are indistinguishable from the real Breitlings and Vacheron Constantin and while the prices are a fraction of the cost of the real ones, there is nothing for a tenner!
I drove to Kalkan on Friday and Kaan came on the bus on Saturday. Having spent two days lying around and eating a lot (sticky toffee pudding was the highlight for me!) we went off exploring yesterday. Demre is a town about 70km east of Kalkan. The drive itself is lovely as the road follows the coast much of the way.
 |
| Lycian tombs at Myra |
In Demre, we headed for the Lycian remains of Myra. This is currently being excavated by a team from Akdeniz University, but the Lycian rock tombs and the large Roman theatre are worth seeing. In the town itself, there is the church of St Nicholas where his remains were held (he was bishop of the town in the fourth century) until the chaos at the time the Ottomans took over enabled ‘pirates’ from Italy to steal them and take them back to Bari in Italy.
It is still a site for pilgrimages – mainly by Russians (I guess because he is the patron saint of Russia) – and it was quite busy but the frescoes inside are lovely. Outside, this is Kaan adding to a mosaic that is being done by visiting children to raise money for ongoing renovations to the church.
