FETHIYE - Turkey's GHOST town, tombs & a BLUE lagoon
Can you imagine carving that out of the rocks? We've arrived at the entrance to the ghost town Kakakoy You can't beat the freshness of that! We've arrived at the official start of the Lycian way! So this is the famous blue lagoon It's really cold! We're Marianne and Chris and we've been travelling full-time since May 2018. It is the best atmosphere ever!! Whilst attempting to drive around the world in Trudy our home on wheels this happened .... All British travellers abroad are advised advised to return now. As borders closed around us, we decided to wait it out in Turkey until we were able to continue our adventure East. We hope you enjoyed this episode, if you do please consider clicking the subscribe button to join our travel community. Okay this morning we have jumped back into Mick and Trudies car, because we're going to a ghost town called Kayakoy.
I'll let him pronounce it because I get it wrong! Yes, Kayakoy a ghost town, it's about half an hour's drive away from Fethiye. So here's the other tomb we were talking about in the middle of the road, what a place for a tomb. So on the way to the ghost village we've stopped off at the Lycian tombs, you can see them in the cliffs behind us, with a view overlooking Fethiye. So we're going to go up and have a look at these, it's only 10 TL to enter which is approximately one pound, and if you have a museum card like we do, it's actually free of charge. Marianne heard the lady in the kiosk making some strange noises and thought they were they're doing the noises to her, but they're having a a video chat with their baby back at home.
I thought you were talking to me! It doesn't matter how many Lycian tombs you see, i'm still amazed at how they create them, how they carve them into the rocks! Absolutely, right let's go up, this is our exercise for the morning. We've got a few hills to climb. Just walking up the hill here, look how amazing this view is.
You can see the snow capped mountains over here, we walked about halfway up, we've been parked up by Çalis beach right at the far end, over there, that's where we've been staying. And then this is sort of the town and the marina that we filmed at. And the tombs are up here! So we're just coming up to the top now, wow, that's pretty impressive Mick, yeah, the Lycian tomb. Look at that! Can you imagine carving that out of the rocks, Mick gives it perspective. You can see how small he is against it.
These columns they're all carved carved out and there's actually a bird's nest, oh yes, a rock nut hatch, look up there with its nest. What's amazing is the rock nut hatches nest, that's a bit of a tongue twister isn't it? It's actually made of mud, it looks like it's part of the stonework, it's pretty safe up there I would say. Absolutely amazing to think this is carved out of the rocks. And what a place for a tomb with a view like that! What do you reckon Mick? How old is this? I think it's about two and a half thousand years old. Wow, it's the Amentas tomb, whether Amentas is buried here I don't know, but it's pretty impressive isn't it? It is, it's pretty impressive! I think this is actually carved from here solid rock going back. Can you imagine how long it would take? Oh my god yeah! Look at that, all the way up there and it's so tall as well! and i'll tell you what, what makes it remarkable for me is there are so many generations that have seen this.
For the last two and a half thousand years, generations have been seeing this, yeah and that in itself could tell a story. We couldn't know how many people have come up and sat to admire the view up here, yeah. You can hear the nut hatch above us alarming because obviously we've got quite close to its nest, but what I wanted to show quickly, before distressing the nut hatch is this big stone door. It looks like it should be made from steel, but it's not.
It's actually stone, and you can see how thick it is. So the detail on the door for me is my favourite bit of this tomb. So these Lycian tombs actually remind us a little bit about the time we went to Petra in Jordan, can you imagine climbing this rock face to carve this out? The people in these tombs must have been very important to have this degree of detail carved.
So the size of these steps are huge look! They're not made for people, they were either giants back in the day ... or they didn't want you to come up! But i'm 6 foot 3, and they're big, they are high steps. This road here, we were just looking at it you we wouldn't get Trudy up here, it's not a good road. This time of year and it's out of season, and during covid times it's quiet. So we were able to drive up here in a Micks car today. But normally, you would park at the bottom of the hill, just at the bottom and walk up.
So don't bring your car! Or you can come by taxi, i love these and then you push the button and they'll come and pick you up. In England all the kids would be pushing that and running away! Probably! Look at this, I love these little alleyways here, look at that, isn't that amazing? There's more tombs as you walk down the road here, what an amazing place and as in most places in Turkey they've got a beautiful big Turkish flag on top of the hill flying! I love that! That's the castle ... actually there's a castle up there. Back in the car for round two, are you going to be able to get in there Mick? I will get in first. I was going to say that or you've been on a diet.
See in Trudy, the steering wheel's on the other side. You climb on in! We're always doing that here, who need yoga ? Who needs yoga? You just did some stretching. So off to Kayakoy.
It helps being able to speak the language doesn't it Mick? Sometimes, sometimes it gets you into trouble. So we're just getting a view of the ghost village now. So we're just going to jump out and have a quick look, it is clear today. So we've just jumped out of the car, because we're getting a view of it now. So yeah, we can just see the village up on the hillside there, yes it is on the hillside there. They were all farming people, so all the flatland was all farming land, so they built on the hillside.
And there's a little port not far away, which is where they sold food, to all the people who were navigating ships, you know and they used to come here, and they used to be fed by these people in this village, amazing yeah! So we've jumped out of the car and we've arrived at Kayakoy, how big is this village? We are just coming up to it, it's about 500 houses and they're all abandoned. you can see it coming up, we're walking into the sun, it's a little bit bright, you can see it here. In front and all the way around there are buildings, so they were saying that normally in the summer, it's absolutely packed with tourists and coach loads coming up here, but obviously this time of year and during covid times, we are fortunate enough to have the place pretty much to ourselves. So we're just wandering around, they've got all these restaurants that would normally be open.
This place would be amazing in the summer, very rustic feel, look they got this old wood-fired oven here, and we're just walking down these little alleys. So we've arrived at the entrance to the ghost town, Kayakoy here. Entry into the town is 10 TL or as we always say, if you have a museum card it's included, well worth getting one if you're visiting lots of sight during your stay here. Kayakoy is located 8 kms South of Fethiye and is a popular touristic spot for those tourists on their way to visit Oludeniz, so although the history of Kayakoy which is known as Kamiya Lessos in the ancient period dates back to 3000 bc.
They've actually had no items discovered, or anything that dates earlier than the 4th century bc. Although it's the end January, you can see all the little daisies and the little flowers coming up. Springtime is definitely trying to push through here in Turkey, there are lovely little purple flowers. You don't have to be super fit to walk around, but you do have to just be a little bit careful that you don't twist your ankle. So in the town here in Kayakoy there are 14 chapels, two churches, two school buildings, one customs building, as well as all the houses.
The houses are approximately 50 m2. Looking around these buildings obviously have been completely abandoned, the natural elements have really attacked these buildings there's no roofs left, they're open to the elements, but you can see on the walls where there would be designs, colouration, and there's still signs of when they would have lived here before so although there's nobody here, you can feel that families would have been here, neighbours, friends, very difficult history here, and I would encourage anyone who's interested in it to look it up. So this gives you an example of what a traditional building here looks like, you can see in the corner here this would have been the fire place, and you'll notice that the top half is plastered and the bottom half isn't and that is because the top half was residential and the bottom half would have housed the animals, you can see the two doors here and some windows in the side I'm sure this building could tell a few stories or two! It's quite strange walking around this town here, to think that it's completely abandoned. And back in the day there would have been so many families and it would have been a lively busy little village, look at this for an old building here. It is inhabited, but wonderful doors, big stone steps and look at the detail on these wooden doors! it's beautiful isn't it and another style of door in the middle there.
Yeah the architecture, this one's a particularly good looking building. This is a lovely spot, you got lovely looking buildings here, and the guys have just found what looks like a very nice fireplace, look at that! That's very detailed compared to what we've seen so far isn't it ? I think this might have been a posh house, what do you think? That's just what I said ! Mick just said that ... This is the posh end of town, we're in the posh end of town, because the detail on this is amazing. There's a lot of history to this little village here, but there is also another story that I found online, which is the residents of Gumeler Island would come here in Byzantine times to escape the pirates! Wow look, we're just walking along and we found another little chapel here ... Let's have a look, we can go in this one.
Wow look at this! It's definitely seen better days! You can see this is where the altar would have been, the font in the corner there, the view out there is spectacular! It's amazing how big this place actually is and I think to walk around and really see most of this village would take you many hours. It goes on for a lot longer than you think. So we're just coming up, there's another church it's gated but you can see through the gate. Wow it's a big one! yeah look at that ... It's a shame you can't go in it, but you have found some water haven't you? yeah This is the water cistern here, let's have a little look, So this is a water cistern and what used to happen was these roofs were flat and they were sealed so they had a flat roof that collected the water and the water used to run down a little crevice here, all the way down and fill up the cistern.
Wow that's amazing, so each place would have their individual water supply ? Yeah that's right. And would each house have one too? Yeah pretty much because there was there's no spring water here. It's famous for its history, but also we've heard that some movies were filmed here.
Russell Crowe filmed for the water diviner movie, but Mick was explaining that this area has been used for quite a few movies, Turkish films and music videos, and I've also heard that this was one of the filming locations for the Netflix series called 'Around the World in a Pandemic in a Van (Caravan)' Starring Uncle Mick, Chris and Marianne! And Jason and the Argonauts filmed here too, was it? There you go! That's a bit of serious stuff Jason and the Argonauts! I'm not very good at cooking and herbs and things, that's really Chris's department but we just saw some local people picking this and it's a herb, it smells like thyme, it smells absolutely delicious. So we're just walking along Mick spotted one of the water pipes that we were talking about here, so the water would have come down this, into the water catcher here, and then there'd be something running off? Yeah or they might have had a tank inside, tank maybe inside? Yeah, here's a tank, there look. Oh yeah this would have been the tank here maybe, it comes inside, and goes into it, runs through the wall, into the into this part. Spring's coming early here in Turkey because the blossom is starting to come out on this tree. I can't believe how warm the weather is today! The forecast today actually was a little bit grey and looking a bit dull, it's actually it's got to be 20 degrees today I. reckon It's warm, t-shirt weather.
How cool does this little water spot look This is where we normally fill Trudy up from these spots. Okay it's a wrap! We're done.... a chicken wrap? A chicken wrap? actually that's a good idea! Let's go for a kebab! What a good idea .... Okay ...
back in the car and we're off to Oludeniz for lunch because we're starving aren't we Trudie ? We are! We are! We are all starving! We haven't had breakfast yet! So we're just driving through Hisaronu which is a bit of a party town apparently? Yes not far from Oludeniz and I think in the summer it's a bit of a party place Mick? Yeah it's like Lloret de Mar in the mountains, lots of bars and nightclubs, cocktail bars, look there's a shop called 'bling'. And a karaoke bar ! Dance bars. It is good fun, if you want to party in the Fethiye area, this is where people come. So we've stopped off for a bit of lunch! They're cooking them all fresh there, look! Yeah a hot wrap, Hello! You can't beat the freshness of that, they've got a nice big wood fired oven in the back there. Oh i love! It isn't that amazing? Yeah There you go, so the wraps have come over now out the fire. Here comes lunch! A bit of lettuce, Oh yeah i'm starving now.
Some onion. Oh look at the meat cooking here, oh there's the meat going on, chicken .... Okay we're back in the car, we're having a quick bit of lunch before we head into town. It looks amazing! Time to eat! On the way to Oludeniz, we've arrived at the official start of the Lycian Way, which runs from here all the way to Antalya. You may remember on one of the videos where we're in the mountains behind Kalkan, that the Lycian way runs through it and it's a walking route from here, for 395 miles I think it is ... is that right? 65! Oh almost! 365 miles .... We're just doing the start of it! Just to show you the sign ..... we're not actually walking it!
There you go, she's off! That's it! that's as far as it goes. So we've just stopped off, you can see the start of the famous blue lagoon in the distance behind us. And that's exactly where we're going to head now and it just shows the colour of the water because of the rocks, even though the sun has gone in and it's still looking amazingly blue! So we're just coming into Oludeniz and Mick and Trudie we're just explaining this part of town, is just all hotels, I bet it's rammed in the Summer. It's very quiet now, most of the shops and places are all closed up and the hotels.
That's the main drag where the beach is, but that's the blue lagoon it's down this way. It is so blue! It's has got a nice long beach. I am taking you down to the blue lagoon now, so this is interesting because here this is where you pay to go into the blue lagoon, okay because it's controlled parking, yeah but if you go to the right of it, yeah you go down behind the blue lagoon, it's a lovely area. So this is the famous blue lagoon, it doesn't look too blue today because the sun has gone in. But it's a very beautiful spot, so translated what does it mean? Well Oludeniz means 'dead sea' you would think it would be flat, but it's not very flat it's not! It is not so calm today and when we were on top of the hill the water was an amazing blue. So why is it so blue? This part of the lagoon is blue because it's got white stones underneath it.
So when the sun reflects down it makes it look really blue. This side is actually the inner part of the lagoon has got sandy beaches, but the part that you pay is on the white pebbles, so it's almost nicer to swim down this end. Yeah, some people like pebbles, some people like sand don't they, but it is packed in the Summertime. I think we're very lucky to be having the place so quiet, there's only a couple of people there come out for picnics and a cup of tea. But yeah absolutely stunning.
This is Babadag mountain is that right? Babadag So it's the 'father' 'mountain' and it's got a nice view on the top Yeah there's a little cafe restaurant up there now, it's fantastic and that's where they all fly from . All the paragliding? Two thousand meters up! So that's about 6,000 feet isn't it? I watched the Mick video who did a paraglide from the top here and then they all land here, you can see them landing on this strip here, unfortunately today, at the moment there's none. But i think they are still going even during covid times. If you contact them beforehand, most of them are here, look there's 'Deep blue' 'Gravity' and those there. This is where you book them normally, if you contact them beforehand, they'll come down if the weather's good, yeah they can still fly and they do a speed boat trip at Deep Blue too. A boat trip across to Butterfly Valley, oh do they? Yeah I was researching this area, the blue lagoon and it said that paragliding here is the best in Europe .... Possibly the best in the World! That's controversial .... but .... Mick agrees ! I think it's high!
I've flown off here 35 times and i've never been up there and not been able to fly, Wow, the weather is amazing, it's just the right amount of breeze and to land on the beach, you can't beat that can you? and then go and have a beer ! There you go! and there's a lovely seafront here, you've got bars and stuff all the way along here, it's very quiet at the moment. And a massive beach, look at this beach! And you can see the blue water! As we said before, in the summer this would be very busy and especially when it's not covid days, but we're lucky to be seeing the beach here when it is so quiet. If you're visiting Oludeniz it's only 9 miles South of Fethiye. With the average summer temperature of 35 degrees and average of 15 degrees in the winter it makes a pretty good holiday location, Okay I've come down to the beach because I wanted to show it's a pebble beach, so I thought I'd show you this .... look at these pebbles, they've been washed by the sea so much that they're just lovely smooth pebbles.
Marianne's going to get her feet wet, but the waves are a bit big! It might go wrong! She might get wet trousers, let's see how this goes... Don't get your car keys wet, that's why I'm leaving my phone there .... You're not planning on going in are you? You're a lunatic! What are you doing? I just want to get my feet in ! Yeah, but the waves come all the way up there! It's really cold! Are you going in? No i'm not that stupid ha ha. So in the village .... What are you doing love? He is so unprofessional ha ha
So this this mountain here, oh you don't want to be in the shot? she's camera shy or something ? Trudies gone camera shy? That's in the bloopers as well that is! There's going to be a blooper special after today, it's going to be hours of bloopers ! So that is the end of ..... no hold on! I don't know what I'm going to say! We hope you enjoyed this episode, if you did don't forget to hit the subscribe button to join us next time, Bye for now!
2021-02-15 05:11
