Days 129-132 05 September-08 September
Cemil dropped us at a tea stop. Allegedly the buses would come in there however that didn’t prove to be the case. After hailing one that was full we ended up dashing across the highway and after about an hour one arrived with a real driver and we took the last seats. Three hours later in Kaş (pronounced cash)met by Nursen our host who drove us to their beautiful apartment that had an amazing location.
We had been driven outside the old town to get to our accommodation and it looked like we were going to be in apartment hell. However, after settling in we found that literally outside our door was the old town of cute small streets full of cafes and bars which led down to the harbour. We definitely won the lottery on this one. We had heard of the “underwater city” of the coast of Kaş and determined that it would be a great thing to kayak over it. We booked a trip for the next day.
We met our guide Mustafa at 0730 and headed by bus for the put-in location in the village of Ucagiz. Our first paddle was to a beautiful little harbour at Tarsanne bay complete with ruins. Here we availed ourselves of the delivery of gozleme by boat. We then set out across the area containing the ancient underwater village of Dolchiste at the edge of Kokeva island. It was destroyed by an earthquake in the second century BC and then rebuilt by the Byzantines before being abandoned. Quite hard to see but definitely, an experience paddling through the turquoise water until we reached the waterside village of Simena (now called Karekoy)where we had lunch included. Our choice of kayaking and departure time was justified as the area can be busy with lots of sightseeing boats and their intrusive PA systems. Simena is only accessible by water and is dominated by a castle on the hill behind it. Our group was only six including us. Mustafa was a great guide and the day was well-paced and great value Sea Kayaking Tours.
The next day we headed out on a cruising yacht called “Dennis”, (not sure of the reason for the name as the skipper was Mehmet) it was a very comfortable boat and we had the luxury of being able to pre-book our sun lounges on the foredeck the night before. We chose the six islands tour which involved sailing out of Kaş and visiting the islands that dot the surrounding coastline. At each stop, we simply jumped off into the beautiful Aegean Sea and floated around before departing for yet another beauty spot. We also rediscovered the joys of snorkelling. Great lunch, great crew and again great value.
Tonight we followed up on a recommendation by our Instanbul friend Ata and headed for the Deja Vu bar which has a magnificent sunset view of Kas and the harbour. It was highly amusing watching the Instagrammers jockeying for the best seat and then sharing mineral water. The bar staff were very friendly, the music eclectic and the view wonderful.
The next day was spent lazing about and then pigging out on one of the best breakfast ever at Pell’s Restaurant-it was amazing.
Sad to leave but the next day our hosts kindly dropped us off at the bus station and we headed down the coast for the town of Akayaka. Turkish buses are super comfortable and they even offer seat side tea and coffee as well as ice cream :-).
Travel Information
Regarding Turkish buses, the best tip we can offer is to check with your local host or at the bus station (otogar). We found that our normal references google maps,rome2rio, and moovit were not useful in Turkey. Also, the online booking services offered by the major companies require local phone numbers, Turkish ID numbers and often Turkish issued credit cards. In fact, with the latter, I was told that call centres would only use those cards but their sales offices accepted mine. The phone number issue can be solved by putting in where you are staying but I couldn’t solve the Turkish ID issue even when ticking a foreign national box. The best solution was to go to the bus station and ask-in the big ones you simply keep saying the name of your destination (check the pronunciation in Google) and someone will direct you. All the companies have roving sales guys who will grab you if they can in some cases it might be advisable to compare prices. Overall the services we used were cheap comfortable and safe.
