Lycian Way Day 6: Kalkan to Kalkan (via Patara)

Kalkan to Kalkan (with a stop in Patara)

Starting km: 88

Finishing km: 121

Distance walked: 32km

Waking up this morning was a treat.  We were in a bed. We didn't have to pack up our camping gear.  And we'd be spending the night in the same place! 

To give Sarah's foot a rest, I walked out to the site of Patara, the capital of Lycia.  I started out walking backwards on the Lycian Way route, headed out of the suburbs of Kalkan and to the southern coast of the bay it sits in.  The trail quickly turned pretty woolly, with a fair bit of rock scrambling and difficult to follow bits. Thankfully it soon climbed up to a low saddle topped by the aqueduct that must have fed Patara.  I was amazed to learn that this section was under pressure, acting as a sort of a siphon. It was topped with huge stone cubes with round holes bored through their centres and lips and recesses around these holes on opposite sides of the blocks.  These must have been sealed with pitch or something to allow the system to water down into the saddle then back up the other side.

Up on the saddle I joined the trail going the correct way (the two directions almost meet at the saddle) and walked through pine Forest and scrubby thorn bush and holly-like plants that gave my lower legs a good exfoliation.

Round the other side I descended the hill I'd been sidling around and encountered the first Lycian ruins, several tombs outside the main excavated area of the city.  I also encountered Sarah! She'd taken a dolmus out to meet me there and had brought along a very welcome picnic (yum to crispy, salty, sour-cheese filled borek!)

After lunch we popped down to the Patara beach for a quick swim, then back to the archaeological site.  It's much more extensive than any of the three sites we'd visited over the past few days (though the theatre was probably the least impressive, and was the only one visitors weren't allowed to climb up and explore).  Smaller still, but impressively reconstructed was the council chambers of the Lycian League. Lycia was perhaps the original republic, and it's government was presented as an ideal by a number of nineteenth century political philosophers.  The founding fathers of the US apparently also looked to Lycia as an example.

Unlike Xanthos, Lycia's end was more of a whimper than a bang, as the League's political influence waned when it came under direct Roman rule and then its economic influence faded when (like so many other great port cities) its harbour silted in.

We were just at the main gate to the city and Sarah was about head back to the Dolmus stop when a Turkish couple in an SUV pulled up and offered us a ride back.  I wanted to walk, but Sarah happily accepted.

My walk back took a slightly different route, and ended with a final view of the Xanthos/Esen River Valley (which, as Sarah pointed out, it felt like we'd got to know far better than necessary) and of Kalkan town spilling down the slopes to the harbour.

As I approached the town along the wide shoulder of the busy D400, I came upon a dog.  I'm not usually a fan of strange dogs while hiking. At best they usually get tangled up underfoot with their friendliness.  Or the bark a lot and leave me nervous or startled. Or at worst they're genuinely threatening. But this one just ran away as I approached, and kept running alongside the busy traffic ahead of me for about a kilometre.  The poor thing was wearing a collar, so probably was far from comfortable being out by the busy road, and seemed scared and probably tired and thirsty too. It followed me into town, but ran off and disappeared when a tiny pet dog probably one fifth its size started barking.  I hope it found its way home okay!

Lycian Way Day 5: Xanthos to Kalkan

Xanthos to Kalkan

Starting km: 70

Finishing km: 88

Distance walked: 18km

This was a day of two halves.  

The morning was great.  The dog that had kept us up all night greeted us cheerfully and accompanied us for the first km or so of our walk (I honestly think now that it probably thought it was protecting us by barking all night near our campsite… who knows, maybe it was!?)

From there most of the morning was spent walking on the aqueduct that fed Xanthos.  Not just near it, but literally on it, as it contoured the hillside. It was in varying condition, but especially as you neared the source it was in great shape, still being used by some locals for irrigation 2500 years after its construction!

Things got tougher as we climbed up through thicker bush and a bit of mud towards the water source.  The whole rest of the day was a bit tiring and frustrating, as the trail bobbed up and down hills, in and out of pine forest and little villages.  In doing this it committed the cardinal sin of trail design, being difficult for no particular reason. The views out over the greenhouses and distant mountains were nice enough, but not worth climbing up a 200m hill, then down again, then up again four or so times over, especially when multiple roads went the same places without all the twists and turns and hills.

It just got a bit frustrating, especially for Sarah who walked most of the day in jandals to aid her blister's healing.  

When we arrived at km 88 in the town of Akbel, we took a (metered but surprisingly expensive, but I understand that in the expat-heavy town the taxis have formed a bit of a cartel) taxi downhill to the town of Kalkan. 

I hadn't realized it until about an hour before we arrived, but Kalkan is ordinarily the kind of place I'd avoid like the plague.  Filled almost entirely with holiday villas and summer homes occupied mostly by British expats, the whole town center is pretty much entirely bars and restaurants.  Accommodation is pricey by Turkish standards too.

But:

1. It's quite pretty and
2. It sits in a spot where the Lycian way almost doubles back on itself as it loops out and around a peninsula to visit the ruins of the Lycian site of Patara.  This means that we can spend two nights in the same place, I can walk out to Patara and Sarah can meet me there by taking a dolmus and give herself a full day of foot healing time before we hit the trail again together day after tomorrow.

We ate (and picked) lots of pomegranates today.