When we booked this trip from Istanbul to Selcuk to Pamukkale to Fethiye and then Rhodes with a travel agent in Istanbul, we couldn’t figure out how he made any money out of us. Reason being, that if we had booked the trip ourselves, it would have cost the same. But, on the bus from Pamukkale to Fethiye, we realized where he would have made some bucks. We were picked up at our bus company by a much smaller bus than we are used to. Initially there were only 8 of us on the bus and then we stopped at another company and picked up some more people and the bus was then nearly full. The one bus station we stopped at we were asked to move seats, which didn’t make sense as there were no seat numbers. We put it down to “that’s the way they do things in Turkey” and moved on.
We drove out of Pamukkale town to Denizli and stopped multiple times to pick up people randomly on the side of the road as they waved down the bus. Donna and I kept saying to each other, “where are these people going to sit?” As the bus was now full and there were people standing. This question clearly was not going through the bus drivers mind. I think his managers brief to him would be two things:
· Pick up every single person that waves you down
· Make us much money as you possibly can
I think his manager must have travelled to SA at one point and taken this idea back to Turkey. At one time I thought the bus was going to start rolling backwards as we started climbing into the mountains. Clearly the busses engine was designed with the capacity to propel the vehicle carrying the amount of people for which there were seats. This bus now had all seats full, some daughters sitting on mother’s laps and the isle completely packed. I thought about offering my seat to a lady maybe 6 years my senior but then I thought to myself, if I do anything to make her comfortable she wont complain and they will continue to use the same system based on the two points mentioned previously. It probably won’t make a difference but I soon dismissed the gesture and stared out the misted up window trying to avoid eye contact with her. To make myself feel better I made a pact that I would offer my seat to her if she collapsed with exhaustion – which she never did thank goodness – as I really didn’t want to stand.
The bus stopped for a 10 minute break and when we got going again, we realized that many of the people had left the bus as some seats were unoccupied and the isle was clear. But this was short lived as we hit the next town and started all over again. But the isle only got half full and I only had to endure someone’s backside bumping my shoulder for about 25mins before more people jumped off the bus and then it was a smooth ride to Fethiye. At one time during our journey, we thought that we would be heading to Antalya first, which is about 120km in another direction, and then go to Fethiye. But thank fully this wasn’t the case.
We arrived at the bus station and shortly after getting off the bus we were approached by someone asking us if we have a place to stay, to which we kindly replied thanks but no thanks. We were then approached by a chap, saying that he had a free shuttle bus, which would take us to our hotel. Free is good, so we went with him and checked into a very cool spot called V-GO, with a great view of the bay for only R350 per night incl breakfast.
Before this chaotic bus journey, we started the day in our restored farmhouse in Selcuk, woken yet again at 5:30am by the call to prayer from the Isa Bey Mosque. We skipped the jog and headed for an early breakfast so that we could be in time for our tour bus to Pamukkale. One thing that really struck us about Selcuk was that it was full of very old people. More so than any other town we had visited. We thought that there must be some special that old age homes had worked out with the local travel agency that brought all the geriatrics to Selcuk. Anyway, at 8:30am we bid farewell to the methane propelled occupants of Selcuk and headed for the next town.
We arrived in Pamukkale around 12pm and went for lunch, which is included in the tour price. We feasted on a very fresh and healthy buffet until properly full. We made a school boy error and thought that the drinks were free as well only to be served with a bill afterwards based on US dollars. With that nasty ripped-off taste in our mouths we got back on the bus to be driven up to the calcium terraces, which have made Pamukkale so famous.
Once inside the gates we nearly ditched our guide, as he was as boring as a bad book, he never smiled once and was only interested in making us spend money. Luckily we didn’t buy his bull about Cleopatra’s pool having healing properties and being the only place you can swim and paying R130 for the experience. So before I u-bolted the oke we decided to go and do our own thing. Only to find that we could swim in the calcium terraces for free. So we did and we took some very cool picks. The calcium terraces have been preserved by a rubberized covering, which is very sticky. Water cascades down these terraces and over the entire rubber covered calcium terraces and due to the sticky nature of the covering you can walk with ease down some of the steep declines. It is annoying that they have placed rubber on the terraces and installed man made pools, but I supposed on one hand they need to preserve the heritage site and it is good for tourism. It was a nice day trip and very interesting to see. But if you do go, don’t get a guide.
I didn’t get a chance to update the blog last night as it was late and the place where we are staying has a braai every night, which I could smell as soon as I got out of the shuttle bus near reception. For R60 you eat WELL. The chicken sosaties were some of the best I have ever tasted.
Looking forward to seeing what Fethiye has to offer. But it is raining and so we are just chilling and waiting for the weather to clear up so we can go for a walk.
The great thing travelling together is that even on rainy days where there isn’t much to do, we still have each other to keep ourselves entertained and is costs nothing.
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