Ekincik - Another description defying beauty spot

We really had no idea where to go next. From here the Turkish coast gets very interesting, with innumerable anchorages and harbours, restricted zones and special environmental zones where a 'Blue card' is required to ensure nobody dumps their black water (read poo) into the area.

We don't want Sally to miss too much either, but that proved problematic from our very first stop...

Ekincik is indeed... 'cik'

A pine treed mountainous backdrop to a (superlative) bay into an immaculate marina into which we were directed, assisted and welcomed. Ekincik is a cooperative which includes the marina with power and water, a small supermarket, a restaurant which sits easily into my top five of all time and boating tours of the nearby Dalyan, the school excursion for the kid's first day back at school.











The water in these parts is so clear, the  visibility so good that it is difficult to gauge the depth before diving off the boat.

Dalyan is way out of context compared with any of the topograpghy so far. An ancient river delta and marshland with the ruins of Kaunos the King tombs and the Dalyan mud baths...

I wonder what the other kids were doing on their first day back?

This Google Earth image shows the marshlands fronted by the white sandy beach, the tiny bit on the left being a Leatherback turtle breeding ground.

On the way to the river mouth, our boat driver hugged the rocky coastline, looking down at the bottom off the front of the boat we could just as well have been floating in mid air, this little natural high interrupted by wild goats and cool caves...

Dalyan River - Turkey

The river running through the Dalyan River marsh is reminiscent of the Zambezi River in southern Africa, minus the crocs, hippo's and elephants.

Zambezi River - Zambia 

Those of you fortunate enough to have canoed the Zambezi east of Kariba you would relate...

...... Back to Turkey.

First stop, the Kaunos Ruins. Kaunos was an important sea port in the 10th century BC but due to silting it now sits 8kms up river. The silting also means there remains a fair bit for the archaeologists to dig up but what is there is pretty impressive. Fortifications on high knolls attract a climb and from here the views are, according to the Author of 'The Book' his favourite in all the world.

Understandable when up there taking it all in.

We were given an hour, but after an hour and a half we trudged back to the boat dissatisfied at not being able to spend more time there. Whilst we found the ruins fascinating, the kids were taken by acorns, the comparison between goat and cow droppings, thorns, tortoises, ducks, a crane and tutt tutting at another misbehaving child....

And then there were the Kaunian Tombs of the Kings and Queens carved into the rock faces and below which has sprung the highly touristic town of Dalyan. Fortunately there is no access to the tombs themselves, so they can only be viewed from a boat on the river or from one of the many restaurants and bars along the river bank. They might last a little longer as a result.

We lunched and ATM'd. Some outlets only take Euro's some Turkish Lira and some both?? it's a pain... but one must suffer a little for this joy I suppose...

Once lunched it was off to the mud baths. Cheap to get in, packed with mud swathed tourists, well enough organised to cope with the hordes. On arrival we found somewhere to leave our valuables, don board shorts and in Summer' case, a bikini. We stepped into a large pool of smelly, muddy water, the bottom dangerously uneven and disgustingly squishy with thick black mud.

Nothing for it but to join the laughing throng and cake ourselves in the stuff, stand in the sun taking photographs while it dried, shrunk and grossed us out. We began to itch and headed,  at pace for the cold showers... These were a rack of multiple, high powered jets 10 feet off the ground. Pick a jet and frantically de-mud.

Now head for the guy with the fire hose. His job is to spray away the last of the remaining mud and the occasional bikini top depending on the endowment there under.... We presume there is a queue for this particular line of employment...

Then into the very smelly sulfurous thermal bath.



And so... tired, ice creamed out and heads full of new knowledge, it was back on the boat for a slow sunset putt home.

The end of a magical first day, back to school excursion.