We boarded our brand new mini bus, only 8 weeks old we were told by our tour leader.
Anyone taller than 5ft 6, bumped their heads on the roof as they came in (I was lucky). The seats where very tight, and not much leg room, I don't think it was designed for long journies.
So off we went to our hotel for the night, after about 2 hours drive, at about 8pm we arrived at the Reis Thermal Hotel. This is quite a nice hotel, we had an apartment, which came with its own thermal spa water tap in a mini spa in the bathroom, so you could have a thermal bath in your room.
The hotel has a swimming pool and a thermal spa with 3 different temperatures of heated water, as we arrived late, there was not much time to enjoy the facilities, so everyone rushed in for dinner, which was included in our tour price (drinks are extra), the buffet was good, I think I over indulged trying to sample all the dished for this review, staff were fairly polite and attentive.
We were rushed out of the dinning hall, because the 'show' was about to start near the pool outside. the show was one guy on the keyboard and a belly dancer doing her stuff.
The belly dancer was ok, but it seemed to be an opportunity for the resident photographer to start snapping away while the belly dancer wriggled next to the tourists, the pictures were available for purchase the next morning as you checked out.
When the show finished most people stayed around the pool having a drink and chat, some went to watch the match on the big screen in the bar, I stayed and took some pictures of the full moon from the balcony instead.
After all the activities had died down, a couple of people braved the open air pool, but not for long I think the water was cold. Some went off to the thermal pool, but that didn't have any lights on.
Anyway I was tired and went to bed, we had to be up early and be out of the hotel by 8:30 in the morning to get to Pamukkale.
I woke up early about 6:30 (had been waking up early all during my holiday), the sun was starting to come out, so I though lets check out the thermal pool before breakfast, the water looked a bit dodgy, and smelt of sulphur, I'm sure it was doing me some good.
Above the pool was a volcano like structure, the top of which was spewing out hot water, there are three shallow pools at different levels, with different water temperatures, top one being the hottest.
After a while I left had a shower and got ready for breakfast, which was fairly good, usual Turkish breakfast, except the boiled eggs smelt as if they had been boiled in the thermal pools, the colour of the egg white was greenish, so I skipped the eggs.
The hotel was pretty good, and I wished we had more time to enjoy the place....
So off we went on our journey to Pamukkale, it was only about 15 minutes away, before we got to Pamukkale we arrived at the ancient city of Hierapolis, not much is left of this city except, but interesting none the less.
After a few minutes of looking around we boarded the bus again and head for our destination, we arrived and are shown the Cleopatra's pool which we could use for swimming at a cost of I think, 16mil TL, the small pool filled with clear spring water is surrounded by a cafe and shops. I didn't try this, good thing I had my thermal swim for free at the hotel earlier that day.
we were left to wander about on our own for the next 3 hours, so we did wander around, I had seen pictures of people walking and splashing about in the pools on the hill side, but we were told that all the area has been blocked off and you can now only walk a narrow path and admire the beauty, look but don't touch..... This was because all the trampling around by thousands of tourists was spoiling the natural white lime sculptures... oh well..
We departed Pamukkale about midday, for lunch just down in the valley below, the lunch was very good, open buffet, hot and cold food, well prepared and served. Nothing to whinge about here I'm afraid.
We left the restaurant pretty well satisfied and content, but that didn't last long.. we were to visit the carpet factory now.... which was not far from there, here we had an intro by a salesman about the
Turkish carpets and natural dyes etc. then were handed over to a trainee who was just learning English, so was having trouble giving us a tour of the place and explaining carpet weaving, while trying to crack bad jokes that didn't translate too well into English.
Anyway we had some tea and were given an introduction into various types and styles of carpets, after which we were invaded by an army of smiling salesmen, eager to help us decide which carpet would be
perfect for us.
No one bought anything, so we moved on to our next destination a few miles down the road, (Metin our guide was not giving in) to an Onyx factory, here we had some more bad jokes and a introductions on onyx
and were ushered into a huge warehouse type store, lucky for us there was a sale on, buy one and get one free! all prices were in US dollars and seemed far too much to me anyway.
I think a couple of people bought some items, so it wasn't a wasted stop....
The tours and shopping out of the way, we settled down for the journey back to Altinkum, this was going to be a long journey 4 hours with a stop in the middle for a quick 15 minutes break along the way.
The journey was uneventful, except that the rather large lady in front of us had not bothered to wash under her arms in any of the facilities along the way, and every time she raised her arms, we nearly choked.
The good thing about the coach trip is that you do get to see the countryside, and it's a beautiful countryside, very green and lush, never ending orchards of fruit trees, peaches and apricots were ripe
on the trees, there were lots of roadside vendors selling fruits, it would have been good to be able to stop and buy some direct from the growers.
After a long day we arrived back to Altinkum, tired but safe...... a good couple of days all in all.
Mushtaq
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