At first Antalya looked like many of the larger cities in Turkey, row after row of off-white or peach apart­ment build­ings all mod­elled after the same design. But once we started walking around, the beauty of the city was apparent.

A typical view of a street in Antalya, Turkey.

The city is located on the Mediterranean ocean. It’s natural for­ti­fic­a­tions resemble those of Dieppe in France. The city is perched on dra­matic and beau­ti­ful cliffs. Walks, prom­en­ades and quaint parks weave in and out along this impress­ive coast­line. The build­ings in the old city all look as if they just received a fresh coat of paint. The shops display col­our­ful shawls, pillow cases and rugs. Above all, the people of Antalya are wel­com­ing, relaxed and friendly.

Rugs for sale in the old town in Antalya. This area is extremely pic­tur­esque and caters to tour­ists in every way.

The beau­ti­ful, well kept build­ings of Antalya. Notice how the upper floor sticks out further then the first floor?

In fact, having just joined CouchSurfing 10 days before arriv­ing, Chris and I were aware of a monthly CouchSurfing meeting occur­ring while we were in Antalya. We were also aware that Ben and Pen, the Australian couple we first met on our Gallipoli Battlefield Tour, were also in the city, so of course we had to meet up with them. On purpose we hunted down the hotel they were staying at. We enjoyed our break­fasts and dinners with them. We also visited the Antalya Museum which does a won­der­ful job of taking you from the stone age to more recent finds from Turkey. The museum costs 15 Turkish Lira ($10 CAN). My advice is to make sure you are well fed before you go to the museum because they do not have any food on site and the secur­ity will not let you re-enter even a few minutes later if you leave (not the greatest cus­tomer service). We unfor­tu­nately had to rush through the museum because we were feeling very faint.

An example at the Antalya Museum of the tra­di­tional Turkish blue tiles.

An example at the Antalya Museum of the tra­di­tional Turkish blue tiles.

The ancient civil­iz­a­tions of Turkey use to bury their dead in large pots. Here is one such indi­vidual on display in the Antalya Museum (15.00 Turkish Lira/person)

This is an ancient burial pot from Turkey. It stands roughly five feet tall. Observing the burial pots on display in the Antalya Museum, I was amazed at how small the major­ity of the pots are, and curious to know just how big the pot would have to be to hold me or Chris. Huge!

We enjoyed the company of our friends but Ben and Pen left Antalya before us, catch­ing the bus that night to Cappadocia. The morning after they left Chris and I were 80% sure we were going to get the bus that night to catch up with them but while enjoy­ing break­fast Chris piped up and said, “I forgot to tell you some­thing...” He men­tioned the .CA contest and I agreed that we should enter. In order to do so we would need to stay and work on the devel­op­ment and full pro­duc­tion of the video in Antalya. We brain stormed for hours at the hotel.  For a break we headed to a cafe with the view of the sea. While enjoy­ing our Efes beer and throw­ing ideas back and forth a man approached us. He asked if he could sit with us and chat. This had not happened to us before, so not wanting to be entirely rude I said he was welcome to sit next to us but that we were busy working. “Working?”, he ques­tioned. After I mumbled a few other things and Chris too was trying to explain he said, “Let me guess. You’re Chris and your Laura.” Chris and I were both shocked and our minds frantic­ally tried to figure out how he knew that. “The blog? Surely not.”, I thought. Then Chris said, “Turker”. And so it was!

Turker is an ambas­sador on CouchSurfing. We had e-mailed  back and forth a few times but had not planned on meeting. He was per­sist­ent and determ­ined to find us. Apparently, while strolling around Antalya with his mom and sister he looked every­where for us. He said he saw us go into the res­taur­ant. At least he was pretty sure it was us. So the three of them sat at another table on the side walk level and when a table became avail­able on the patio where we sat they changed tables. Whipping open the ever handy cell phone he signed onto CouchSurfing and had his mom and sister compare our profile photo with us. They agreed, it must be us and he was right. Can you believe it?!

Needless to say we put the video work aside and had the most enjoy­able after­noon hanging out with Turker and his mom and sister. We chatted as we fin­ished our beers and with Turker as our guide we hopped onto a city bus to visit the local water­fall. We returned from the water­fall just in time to catch the 6:30 pm nightly light and water show at the cities main down­town park. I haven’t seen such a won­der­ful display and syn­chron­iz­a­tion of water and music since Disneyland.

It just so happened that it was also the day of the CouchSurfing Antalya meeting. So, promptly after enjoy­ing a lovely meal with Turker and his sister, we went to the des­ig­nated bar to meet and meet and meet. In the course of the evening and into the wee hours of the morning Chris and I made con­ver­sa­tion with many locals and some other trav­el­lers who came to the meeting as well. We could not have found a better way to start meeting the CouchSurfing community.

In Antalya the pomp-trees come equip with buttons to hail a taxi. Amazing! I think this is some­thing Canada should pick up, perhaps not the pomp-trees but I’m sure an Elm or Blue Spruce would do just a good.

The next day I was hit with my first case of food pois­on­ing which left me toilet/bed ridden for one day and night. With determ­in­a­tion, between visits with the toilet, I put on a smile and we filmed the footage you see in our .CA video entry.

The next day it seemed my visits with the toilet were over so we decided to catch the 10-hour night bus to Cappadocia. All in all it took my stomach  five days to fully recover from my first exper­i­ence with food poisoning.