Plod's Lycian Log: Day 5: Gavuragili to Xanthos

Sunday 6th April, 2014

Oh, where have I landed today? I'm in a Pansyon in Patara - but I feel like an alien who's been dropped into other people's lives. In this world, there's a peasant grandmother, with a loud, harsh voice and a baby granddaughter with a beautiful smile, and three adult males, of two generations - so far; there's a big family home with a spare room and bathroom for me, and a TV keeping out the silence; there's no Internet and not a word of English spoken or understood - which is, of course, quite reasonable. So, I must get by with my very limited Turkish: hello, please, thank you, water, good, how are you, hitchhike, hot milk, unique (there's a story there...), good morning, goodnight - and that's about it. But I'm only here to sleep and tomorrow I'll take a dolmus back to Xanthos to resume my walking.

So, my day......

I left Candan's Garden at 8.30am after a nice breakfast with Ali. Another false start as I forgot to pay him and got about 500m down the hill before I remembered. Ditched the pack and went back, surprised that he hadn't asked for payment.

I missed the path I'd wanted to take, until it crossed the road I had walked on for 4kms. From there, the Likya Yolu took me very slowly through the ruins of Pydnai. Quite often the most well-worn path is the wrong one. It's clearer because it's constantly being double-tramped as we all make the same mistake; so, you really have to be alert for the waymarks. It's fun, though, working them out, and again, today, they were fool-proof.

Made my way down to the beach and then, on advice from both Brea and Ali, I caught a dolmus to the turn-off to Letoon. There is an 8TL entrance fee to the ruins, but they are worth every kuru. The ruins made a good lunch stop for me. Weird to sit in such an ancient theatre eating my popcorn (well - bread,cheese and an orange.)

From Letoon, I walked 5kms to the ruins of Xanthos. They are near the quite big town of Kinik - tomato growing capital of the world, I might guess. The town seems quite drab and dreary, on entering over the bridge, and I was quite happy to take Kate's advice and take a dolmus out to Patara for the night. So, while in Kinik, I left my pack at the otogar and went to explore the ruins of Xanthos. I was keen to see the Lycian "Rosetta Stone", inscribed in both Lycian and Greek, that Kate mentions in the guidebook but didn't find it. Sill, a lovely wander....

Tricked, on the way here. The dolmus dropped me at the turnoff to Patara, with about 5kms further to walk. I was told, there, that dolmus services to Patara itself had stopped for the day but, after walking about a kilometre, I got a ride from a "not in service" dolmus. I asked the driver to stop at the first pension we came to - and here I am.