Paradise in the East

Olympos treehouses
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The overnight bus trip between Celcuk and Antalya (on the south coast of Turkey) was forseeably painful and quite eventful, with a couple of propositions from sleazy Turkish men....directed at Amber of course.  From Antalya we took a Dolmus (local bus) for another couple of hours to Olympos.  Much to our great regret, we only stayed in Olympos for a few hours, resting on the comfortable Turkish couches amongst the treehouse hostels.  We aim to go back!!  From there we were shuffled off to another bus to Demre, from where we set sale for paradise in the (relative) east.

Look for the snow in the distance!
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Four days and three nights of absolute bliss is all we can say.  Cruising along the Aegean in a wooden Turkish gulet, we had a cosy cabin, awesome food prepared for us all day long and great company in our fellow backpackers Aaron, Jo and Mike (Aussie, Kiwi, Kiwi).  During our voyage we swam in crystal blue water and balked at the scenery - look closely at the photos....beach, in front of green hills, in front of snow capped mountains!  Amber burned to a crisp on the first day, caught unaware by the amazingly hot weather for the time of year.   We moored at butterfly valley, at which we climbed barefoot over sharp rocks for a couple of kms, to reach a stunning waterfall.  We also stopped at the town of Kas and at the Blue Lagoon, Oludeniz, claimed to be the country's most beautiful beach.

Aquarium bay and our gulet!
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It was with heavy hearts that we left the boat....but our misery was put aside for the afternoon as we headed off with our ANZAC contingent to a nearby pub to try some apple tabacco in a waterpipe.

Turkey is amazing.  We only visited about a hundredth of the things worth doing and would love to go back!