We arrived in Olympos yesterday afternoon. From Antalya, we took a minibus into along the coast and the mountains. It dropped us off at a random station along a main road, and when we got out another minibus beckoned to us: 'Olympos! Olympos!' Confused, we got on and continued riding through the mountains until we reached a clearing full of treehouse pensions. There seemed to be nothing around but pine trees & noisy cicadas, whose deafening buzzing had been following us around Turkey since Cyprus. I hope they are mating successfully. There are many that serenade us at night.
We came to the Şaban Family Treehouse Pension and decided to try out a real treehouse. It was built from real tree branches and sat on stilts about 7 feet off the ground. It had a rudimentary door with no lock and only 1 lightbulb. We would have to use shared bathrooms and showers. We dropped off our belongings & returned to the patio to talk to the patron, an Aussie who convinced us to stay until Friday (we arrived on Tuesday) for his friend's cruise to Fethiye. So we tentatively set up some activities with his help - lounging on the beach today, visiting the Chimera Flames tonight, & kayaking tomorrow. When we returned to our 'romantic' treehouse, I found the bottom half of my pack covered in black ants. Apparently, I set my pack on a crushed berry & they swarmed all over my pack devouring it. Of course, I freaked out & swatted my pack until every last ant was gone. I commenced to squealing when I saw the entire carpet covered in ants, though Robby's pack was left untouched by the critters. Robby went back to the patron & requested that we transfer into the plush private bungalow with private bathroom. He even showed the patron the video he took of my frantically flicking ants off my pack. All I can say is, hey, I'm from the 'burbs & I concede to the fact that I can't rough it like a real backpacker! Robby agrees that he doesn't either.
Today we walked through some interesting ruins - a 2nd century BC Roman gate, a 2nd century AD mosaic temple, a necropolis filled with sarcophagi (large stone tombs with Medusa's head & garlands carved on the outside, plus a lid, into which entire families - rich ones - would be sealed), and Marcus Aurelius's sarcophagus. The end of the ruins walk lead us to a long beach full of rocks & pebbles. We went swimming in a cove with the REAL Mount Olympos* in sight. The water looked oily beneath its surface, which unsettled Robby, who claimed that the handful of gülets (traditional boats), yachts, and small motorboats caused the water's strange consistency. Nonetheless, the beach was beautiful and it was certainly surreal for us to swimming beneath Mount Olympos, where the Greek gods once dwelled.**
Robby said that he saw Zeus wink at him from the mountain top.***
*, ** upon further research, we learned that this was not the "real" mt olympos (which is in greece). Olympos means mountain in Greek, so many mountains take this name. The dude on the minibus led us astray. Our faith in minibus dudes has been broken.
However, the evening of writing this posting we went to chimera, a place about 5 miles from our bungalow where flames constantly pour out of the side of mt olympos because of the methane gas that is emitted (we'll add pictures of this strange phenomenon later). More importantly, a sign at the foot of the mountain said that the original olympic game (in anatolia) was a race from these flames to the city of olympos (near our bungalow) in which the runner carried a burning torch the whole way(lit with the chimera flames). Supposedly, this is the origin for the tradition of carrying the olympic torch. Hence, OUR mt olympos is significant for some reason. ...or the sign lied as well, in which case our faith in signs would be broken too.
***That must have God (i.e., Allah). ...or a large Turkish man with a white beard (i.e., Santa Claus)
1. Jeanne walking up to tree house
2. Jeanne lounging in tree house with foot against tree ...before said tree was overrun with ants.
3. Robby cowering under Roman temple from second century BC (according to the sign)
4. Jeanne munching on our Mt Olympos
5. Sitting above the flaming mountain, wishing for a marshmallow.
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