{"id":7117,"date":"2016-11-30T23:43:36","date_gmt":"2016-12-01T06:43:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/?p=7117"},"modified":"2016-11-30T23:43:36","modified_gmt":"2016-12-01T06:43:36","slug":"touring-turkey-part-8-antalya-and-aspendos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/2016\/11\/30\/touring-turkey-part-8-antalya-and-aspendos\/","title":{"rendered":"Touring Turkey — part 8 — Antalya And Aspendos"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continuing with our tour… Waking up early in our hotel in Antalya, I headed out to explore Old Town soon after sunrise. The night before was busy, with people meeting in restaurants and pubs. Sunrise was quiet and streets were empty. I waited in a street close to the hotel and waited for someone to appear. After a few minutes, an early morning street walker appeared.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0050-Street-Walker-Old-Town-Antalya\"<\/a>

Street Walker, Old Town, Antalya<\/p><\/div>\n

The image above give an indication of narrow width of the street… just over one car wide! Although we had a small bus, it is obvious why we would not be able to navigate the Old Town streets in the bus.<\/p>\n

As the sun rose, it lit up a line of water tanks mounted on the roof of a nearby building.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0026-Roof-Top-Water-Tanks-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Roof Top Water Tanks, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

In one of the nearby streets, I found these blue doors closing off parking area behind someone’s house.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0055-Blue-Doors-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Blue Doors, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

Traveling through Turkey, one finds many groups of men having conversations and sipping tea around a table. This looks like one location, where the colorful chairs and chest were packed away for the night.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0076-Street-Furniture-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Street Furniture, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

Here, one early morning shopper stop to buy some fruit at a street vendor. Shopping for breakfast?<\/p>\n

\"1820-0077-Shopping-For-Fruit-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Shopping For Fruit, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

Many people in Turkey drink bottled water. Tap water is not always fit for drinking! Some enterprising person collected and bagged blue bottle caps from water bottles. I found this bag hanging from one of the street walls.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0080-Bag-Of-Water-Bottle-Caps\"<\/a>

Bag Of Water Bottle Caps<\/p><\/div>\n

Across the street from out hotel was this restaurant. There are several quotations decorating the exterior walls. In this image is the following.<\/p>\n

“Don’t bother me; that’s all I ask of you”.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is a quotation by the Greek philosopher Diogenes (aka Dijayen), that I found interesting. Find out more information on Wikipedia<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0087-Empty-Tables-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Empty Tables Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

I found one store close to the hotel, where I found beads and bowls.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0099-Beads-And-Bowls-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Beads And Bowls, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

Old Town has many Ottoman houses. This is one of the more interesting doors that I found.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0115-Ottoman-Door-Old-Town\"<\/a>

Ottoman Door, Old Town<\/p><\/div>\n

Soon after, I headed back to the hotel for breakfast. After packing up, we left Old Town by way of Hadrian’s Gate. Hadrian was a very popular Roman emperor. Many of the ancient sites that we visited had statues of him and gates named after Hadrian.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0121-Hadrians-Gate-Antalya\"<\/a>

Hadrian’s Gate, Antalya<\/p><\/div>\n

This arch shows a detailed ceiling stonework, that is typical of many Roman buildings.<\/p>\n

\"1820-0129-Hadrians-Gate-Arch\"<\/a>

Hadrian’s Gate Arch<\/p><\/div>\n

Arriving at the parking lot, our luggage arrived at the bus by taxi. After loading up, we headed towards Konya by way of Aspendos. The theater in Aspendos is a magnificent structure. This is extremely good condition, probably because it was occupied and cared for by Ottomans. Around the top perimeter of the theater is a gallery with many arches that look out across the seats and the stage.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0016-Aspendos-Roman-Theater\"<\/a>

Aspendos Roman Theater<\/p><\/div>\n

We climbed up the theater steps to reach the gallery. Inside the gallery are a ring of arches, that stretch out along the perimeter. This is captured in the following image.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0052-Gallery-Aspendos-Theater\"<\/a>

Gallery, Aspendos Theater<\/p><\/div>\n

From one of the arches, I captured the view over the seating, the stage and the distant mountains.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0056-Aspendos-Theater-Stage\"<\/a>

Aspendos Theater Stage<\/p><\/div>\n

The image below shows more detail of the wall above the stage.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0062-Stage-Wall-Aspendos-Theater\"<\/a>

Stage Wall, Aspendos Theater<\/p><\/div>\n

Several people had been visiting the theater during the morning. However, I this image I was lucky to catch a single lone audience member once crowds had moved through.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0079-Lone-Theater-Audience-Aspendos\"<\/a>

Lone Theater Audience, Aspendos<\/p><\/div>\n

The city of Aspendos was supplied with water by means of an aqueduct. Climbing the hill above the theater gives a great view of the surrounding countryside and ruins of the aqueduct.<\/p>\n

\"1821-0120-Aspendos-Aqueduct\"<\/a>

Aspendos Aqueduct<\/p><\/div>\n

After leaving Aspendos, we stopped for lunch at a roadside restaurant. Gozleme (pancakes) was the main specialty of this restaurant — yummy!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continuing with our tour… Waking up early in our hotel in Antalya, I headed out to explore Old Town soon after sunrise. The night before was busy, with people meeting in restaurants and pubs. Sunrise was quiet and streets were empty. I waited in a street close to the hotel and waited for someone to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1263,1233,275,1272,186,1274,1273,1224,1179,1237,110,636,292],"class_list":["post-7117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-general","tag-antalya","tag-aqueduct","tag-arches","tag-aspendos","tag-gallery-2","tag-hadrian","tag-narrow-streets","tag-old-town","tag-ottoman","tag-roman","tag-ruins","tag-theater","tag-turkey"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t