Day One – The Flight

We were up at 3am to get to Gatwick for a 6.45am check-in. Our flight was with Excel Airlines. It had bad reviews on the internet and they are renowned for losing luggage. We had to check our back packs into oversized luggage and hoped this wasn’t going to be a black hole.

The plane was a Boeing 767-200 and was about 100 years old. It still had ashtrays. When I went to the toilet, it kept on flushing when I sat on the seat. I tried squatting instead, but the stupid thing still kept on flushing. In fear of being sucked out, I stopped mid-stream, my bladder still half-full, and when I flushed, it started howling at me (the loo that is, not my bladder). I warned Mike not to use this nutcase toilet in fear of never seeing him again.

Other than that, the flight was good. The meal was nice and the crew were friendly. In addition, our baggage arrived safely.

Day Two – The Induction

The induction was half a day wasted that would have been better-spent paragliding or water skiing. Our Antolian Sky rep told us a lot of useless information and got us to book marked up excursions.
We booked a rental car, sea kayaking, and river canoeing.

In the afternoon, we caught a free taxi to a beach club, expecting it to be all watersports and excitement. When we arrived, it was just a load of people lounging around reading books. This is a typical British thing to do. We had a swim, which was rather refreshing due to the fresh water springs in Kalkan Bay.

Day Three – Gorgeous Turkey

On Monday, we rented a car for the day to go exploring. First stop was the Saklikent Gorge, which was about a 45-minute drive on bumpy roads whilst desperately trying to avoid mad Turkish drivers. “Mike, aren’t we supposed to be driving on the right side of the road?”

We arrived at Saklikent and were accosted by what we thought was a car park attendant. He stopped us. “You park here, car park free,” he says, directing us to a car parking space. As we got out of the car, we got an earful. “My restaurant cheaper. Town -10 lire, here 8 lire” and blah blah blah on and on it went. Trying to be polite, we stopped and listened for about 10 minutes when we finally had to prise ourselves away from him. We definitely wont we eating there.

It cost 3 lire to get into the gorge but it was well worth the expense! We had to cross a stretch of water that was hip deep on me, rushing very fast and was freezing (think I’ll give rafting a miss!). Some kids helped us across. Help was a good idea, considering the expensive camera gear on my back. On the other side the kids say “Tip, Tip”. Always a catch, but oh well.

The gorge is spectacular. It is 20 km long, 4 kms of it being walkable.

After the walk, we stopped at a restaurant, situated on a wooden platform suspended just above the rushing waters. We chilled out, sitting on the Turkish rugs and cushions drinking Turkish beer. I must set up an outdoor area like this when I build my ideal home!

As we walked back to our car, shop owners tried to sell us cheap touristy crap. About an hour later, we arrived back at the car, arms loaded with cheap touristy crap.

The next stop was Tlos. We weren’t sure what was there, but apparently, it was a good place to go. Turns out it was a place of ruins. It was cool, check out the photos.

We arrived back at the hotel about 5pm, just in time for complimentary tea and cakes.
End of day Three.

Day Four- Sea Kayaking

The bus picked us up at 8am for the long, but scenic drive along the coast to Kas (pronounced Kash). At Kas, we changed buses and it was a 45-minute drive to Kekova, where we would kayak over a sunken city.

This second bus drive was extremely scary. The bus driver seemed somewhat distracted, driving with one hand, texting with the other and also what looked like playing with his prayer beads. He was doing all this while driving down a very steep and narrow road with sheer drops down the side.

By some miracle (possibly Allah’s doing), we arrived at Kekova unscathed. We hopped into some very old and dated sea kayaks that at first seemed to be very wobbly. Not like the stable sit on top kayak, we have at home. We kayaked across to an island and had a swim in the warm Mediterranean water.

We paddled to the sunken city. It really just looked like a load of rubble from the surface. It would have been ideal to snorkel over, but it is a national park so swimming not allowed.

We paddled back to the mainland and had a drink. Some people climbed up to see the castle, but we are very much “Not another Freaking Castle” kinda people.

We then paddled back to where we started from for a buffet style lunch that had been sitting around all day in the open, probably with flies crawling all over it. Famished, I didn’t care and tucked into it big time. The food was delicious. There was fish, chicken, garlicky aubergine, yoghurt dips, beans, pastas, rice’s and much more. It was YUMMY!

Then we had the scary ride back to the hotel, just in time for a complimentary wine tasting evening.

Evening Four – The Wine Tasting

Mike had strict instructions not to let me drink too much due to river canoeing the next day. The Turkish wines were actually quite nice. The whites were “Ok”, but the reds were actually delicious. They were right up there with the Australian reds, the Shiraz being my favourite.

Once all the wine was finished, Mark, (from Manchester), challenged me to a swimming race. Me, being the competitive person that I am, accepted. Fully clothed I dived in on my ring (inflatable ring that is) while Mark dived in on his dolphin (inflatable dolphin that is).

I paddled like mad with no intention of losing. I made it to the end of the pool and Mark was only half way! Paddling back he tipped me off my ring (inflatable ring that is), but I somehow recovered it, and went on to win!

After the race, everyone was now in the pool, fully clothed. We were diving and jumping right in front of the sign that said no diving and jumping.
It was a very fun night.

Day Five – River Canoeing

At 9.30 am, the bus picked up for river canoeing. “Enjoy a relaxing day gently floating down the Xanthos River,” the glossy brochure said. Then why do all the people on this bus look like hard-core adventure types? I thought that maybe we were on the wrong bus heading for white water rafting for paragliding or something. “Excuse Me,” I said to the people behind me. “Is this the river canoeing trip”? They confirmed that is was indeed.

We arrived at the river to find it was flowing quite fast. The canoes were old and appeared to be made of brick.

They brought us some old life jackets, which I imagined probably, wouldn’t work. Strange that the life jackets weren’t mandatory, but we were certainly wearing them. We hopped in the canoe and started drifting down the river. After about a km, they pulled us all over to the side. “What’s going on?” I asked one of the other couples. “We are at the first rapids, and they are sending us down one by one” they replied. Rapids? Nowhere in the brochure did this trip mention rapids!

They had us all facing backwards so we couldn’t see what was going on. There seemed to be a lot of screaming as people were capsizing all over the place. Poor Mike, he is not at all water confident and I would dread us falling out. I said to him, “whatever you do, just relax and don’t fight it”, knowing that if you tried to fight the rapid we would almost surely tip out. Therefore, we did exactly that. I actually found it quite exciting and a lot of fun. A load of water came in at the side threatening to tip us, but luckily, we stayed upright. Back on land, we had a huge slice of watermelon before continuing.

Rapid two was even bigger than rapid one, and we were the first to go. We went down a little waterfall, then the rapids, and they were shouting something at us, but we weren’t sure what. Next thing we crashed head first into the side of the bank. Luckily, we didn’t tip out. The next couple did exactly the same thing but they tried to avoid hitting the bank and tipped out! I think we were just better at it than they were. There were quite a few capsizes on this particular rapid, so we considered ourselves to be competent rapidists.

The last rapid was so much easier, especially since we have our confidence up. We stopped for lunch and a swim. The river was cold and I had a lot of fun trying to swim against the current.Lunch was a delicious barbecue. Chicken on skewers and the yummy Turkish rice. And of course, some beer.

After lunch, it was a bit of a struggle as there was a strong headwind. We saw a family of turtles sunning themselves on a rock. Alas, we were floating too fast to stop and get a photo.
Next stop was a mud bath. I gave it a miss, as it looked a bit muddy. Everyone else seemed to be having a good time though.

End of day Five.

Day Six – The Turkish Bath

On Thursday, Mike decided to have a Turkish bath, so I went along to watch and take embarrassing photos to put up on the internet.

Pumpkin (the bather) laid Mike (the bathee) out on a giant marble slab. Mike was exfoliated, smothered in bubbles, and washed all over. Then he was given a massage and was stretched into some (what looked like) uncomfortable positions. It looked like a lot of fun (NOT!) so I decided against it.

In the afternoon, we went to a market and tried haggling for some touristy stuff, but they are too well off here. We managed to get 2.5 YTL off some spices and grinders, and a free box of Turkish delight and that was it! Give me Thailand for bartering any day.

For lunch, we stopped at a roadside pancake stall. This was probably our worst meal here. I wanted meat and spice, but they were out of meat. Then I chose vegetable, but they were out of vegetable. That left cheese or potato. I asked for potato. Shortly after a man came out and disappeared on his scooter. He came back 5 minutes later with potatoes and coke. Mike had the cheese one. They were both very salty and not a lot of flavour.

The evening meal was barbecue night. For about £12.50, we had a huge selection of cold mezze (starters similar to tapas). Then they just kept bringing out loads of meat on skewers. It was delicious.
End of day Six

Day Seven – The Last Day

It was our last day in Kalkan, and my left ear was totally blocked. In fear of being unable to fly, I visited the local doctor. He said I most definitely couldn’t fly, so he syringed it. All the brown crusty stuff that came out was quite gross and it really hurt quite badly. However, being able to hear again was bliss. The bill though was huge. 150 YTL, which equates to about £70. They sure know how to rip the tourists off here.

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