Altinkum Things to Do

The church was built in the 6th century A.D, understood to be the church for the Archbishdopric and comprises of three wings. The middle nave is separated from the others by the rows of Doric columns on its sides. The apse has not completely been escavated.
It is understood that the church originally had a flat roof, and that the dome was added later.

Built in the 4th century BC this theatre is still in good condition. Like all ancient Greek theatres, the building consist of three main parts i.e. the Skene (stage building), the Orchestra (horseshoe shaped space in middle) and the Cavea (space where the spectators sat).

Taking into consideration all the present day remains, it has been calculated that the cevea had 50 rows of seats and that it had the capacity to seat an audience of 5,000 people.

Dating back to 4th century BC, this temple, located on the culminating point of the city, rose over a wide terrace of rocks and the defence walls and it was the largest, oldest, most important and most magnificent building in Priene. It was oriented on an east-west axis in conformity with the city plan and faced east.
The building was completely destroyed in an earthquake in ancient times and the pieces were scattered over a large area. Fortunately, the construction of the plan and the reconstruction of the building have been possible through the fragments found in the excavations.
The building rests on a three-stepped platform, 37.2 meters long and 19.15 metres wide. Th columns of which the bases are built in the Ephesus type, have 24 flutes in their shaft.

Also try and take the trip to Soke Market, its massive and lots of Bargains on offer, the Gold shops there are also cheaper than in the resorts, we picked up some real bargains, Make sure you Barter as you will definately get it cheaper that way.

We opted for the two day trip to Ephasis and Pammukale, which was very good value for money and enjoyable but very tiring. It is two very full days, the first day is spent at Ephasis which consist of a 3 hour stroll in the heat through the town, ensure that you take your hat and plenty of water with as it turns warm very quickly and we saw no places to buy more water. A lot of time is spent in the coach as it is quite a distance away. We slept in a lovely hotel in Pammukale that had a lovely pool, thermal bath and jaccuzzi, and all were used by us. Dinner was at the top of the hotel overlooking the cotton clad mountains in this dry and dusty landscape area. Early the following morning we went up to the white mountain and walked around. Do ensure that you take your sunglasses with you as it could be blinding. Afterwards we spent 3 hours at the Cleopatra pool which was fantastic before our long trip back to Altinkum. Was well worth doing though and something that I would recommend rather than doing a one day trip to Pammukale where you spend 6 hours on the road.

A Turkish bath is one of the nicest and most relaxing things that you can go and do whilst in Turkey. Starting with a lovely hot sauna where you feel like you are going to just pass out eventually from the heat, to the warmed marble table where you receive first your rub down to get rid of old skin and then on to the soap foam massage where you feel like telling the guy never to stop. The second one I went for, I also had a head shampoo massage and after some relaxation time, the oil massage which was to die for. I felt so relaxed and revitalized at the same time it is not able to be described, but something you have to experience. We got our first one for free due to booking two organised tours with Love Tours, but had to pay extra for the massage. Turkish baths vary in price from 8 – 20 pounds depending on what they do.

We did a boat trip booked with Love Tours that had 5 stops in all for swims the sea is nice and calm and beautifully blue. You have the opportunity to ride on the doughnuts and banana boat as they follow you around, together with the ice-cream boat. Lunch is included and it was nice. All our drinks which covered beer, wine, cooldrinks, tea, coffee and water were included in the price. It was a nice and relaxing trip, good for topping up your tan. All the boats follow the same route but some boats are louder than others, music etc. Excellent value for money I found.

Highly recommended, as you can see from the picture we had a swim stop, but it was quite a way out from the beach, ans as I was alone with my then 9year old son, I made him promise to stay near to the boat till I put the camera into my bag and dived in after him. It was really exhilerating, and he is a good swimmer, or I would not have done this.

Here is an example of what the base of some of the column's look like at the Apollo temple. The amount of work that went into building and decorating these temples are breathtaking.

The reliefs on this picture is representing Eros hunting, and was part of the stage building dating back to 2nd century AD. So much detail, just wonderful