Antalya, Türkiye

We had a strict schedule today in order to see a couple Roman ruins on our way from Konya to Ankara.

We had another large breakfast. I was starting to get out-large-breakfast’d at this point. Checked out, packed up the car, and were on the road by 10am, right on schedule.

First was a three hour drive to Aspendos Theatre through the mountains (literally). I don’t know our maximum elevation, but both of us had popping ears. Towards the two-hour mark, we went through the 5km long Demirkapı Tunnel. I looked up the route afterwards, and this stretch of the D687 highway is popular with motorcyclists. It’s a very scenic road, and fun to drive.

The weather completely changed after we exited the tunnel. On the mountainous Konya side, it was about 9C, cloudy and raining on-and-off. On the Antalya side, it was a warm 18C, with Mediterranean air and the sun shining.

Both the ruins on our list were just off the D400 highway. First up was Aspendos Theatre. Google took us to a parking lot just by the entrance gates. We looked around for a parking attendant, but apparently it was free parking. Not sure how that happened but we didn’t complain.

Bought our Aspendos tickets, cash only cause their credit card system was down, and entered.

From the ticket booth, there’s a path right into the theatre, at stage level. It’s pretty impressive from the stage, looking up at 7,000 or so limestone seats. We were also lucky that there was only a handful of other tourists there when we arrived. We walked up to the top level for a different vantage point. A couple busloads arrived shortly after, but it still didn’t feel crowded. According to the internet, Aspendos is the best preserved Roman theatre of the ancient world. It’s pretty cool, and I'd say the best of the Roman theatres we’ve seen.

There’s more to Aspendos than just the theatre, but that’s the main attraction. We carried on, stopping for lunch at a family-run roadside place just outside the ruins. They only did gözleme, a Turkish flatbread stuffed with spinach and feta, and they did it well. The gözleme was cooked to order, with older women rolling out the dough, folding in spinach and feta, which the men then cooked it on a metal dome sitting over a fire. We split one gözleme and had a ayran each. The restaurateur seemed happy that we knew what ayran was. It was a nice little spot for lunch, and quick too.

The next Roman ruin, Perge Ancient City, was just another 20 minutes down the D400. This was a little more chaotic at the entrance. First we paid our parking fee (only 30 TRY, about 1 CAD). Then someone else came to our car and collected our park entrance fees (about 25 CAD each).

Once you get past the parking gate and have paid both the parking fee and the entrance fee, there’s no further ‘entrance’. The park isn’t clearly marked, so we weren’t sure where we were until we found signage beside a couple ruins and matched them up with a map of the park.

Now that we knew where we were, we walked back to the Roman Gates and began our tour. The highlights for me were the Hellenistic City Gate with its two huge towers, and the colonnaded streets. It’s a very sprawled set of ruins, it took us about 90 minutes to wander around. Most of the bus tours had already all left for the day (the park closes at 5pm), so we had the site pretty much to ourselves.

Later, I realized we had missed the Perge theatre, which is across the road from the parking entrance. It’s included in the same ticket. We’ll be seeing more theatres later on so it’s not the end of the world.

It was only a 20 minute drive to our hotel in Antalya, just outside the old city walls. The last part was down a narrow alley, squeezing past families sitting on their doorsteps. I WhatsApp’d the hotel (more like an Airbnb) and they came over to check us in, and lowered the chain so we could park in the empty lot across the laneway.

We hauled our suitcases and backpacks up the stairs to our room. We opted for a functional place in Antalya, cause the boutique places in the historic center are also in clubland central.

We showered and then went out for dinner. We’re back on the coast, so tried a fish place. Everything in the historic center is overpriced, although the fish was fresh and cooked perfectly.

We walked back to our hotel through the winding streets. The historic centre here was similar to the hip areas in Athens or Tbilisi. They’re all party towns full of character, hip bars & restaurants, and winding cobblestone alleys. In our younger years we would have just enjoyed the party :)