Family Trip: Turkey (Sun and Fun)

This excursion has its impetus, like the original trip to Turkey, with Elise.  On the Sunday morning after we arrived, the hotel rep for First Choice gave a presentation about different activities available during the week.  Her description of Sun and Fun was that "you drive around the hills in morning and get all dusty, then spend the afternoon on a boat where you jump off the top deck to wash the dust off."  Kristine poked me and pointed to Elise, who had a huge smile of eager anticipation on her face.  I was a little on the fence about doing this excursion or not.  Elise's smile tipped the scales.

We had three Land Rovers with guests from hotels around Ozdere.  We were in the English-speaking one.  There was another one for the Germans, and a third for the French.  The main driver, who was in our vehicle, did an impressive job of being a tour guide in three languages.  Here we are part way up the first mountain on the way out of Ozdere.

The Land Rovers were evidently built for the Turkish military.  Once they've been used for at least ten years, the military sells them to travel agencies for excursions like this one.  Having spent so much of my adult life driving in vehicles that are increasingly digital, this view of the Land Rover was refreshing.

Although I don't enjoy them as much as my father does, the dirt roads were a treat.  This is a view out the back of our Land Rover looking at the one behind us.  The girls and I decided that while my dad would enjoy these roads, he would think they were not in bad enough shape to truly be fun.  Either that or they needed to be considerably muddier than they were.

One of our stops was at a gypsy camp.  It was an interesting mix of old and new technology.  The dwellings were a combination of stone and canvas, but they had a pickup truck and tractor.  It's evidently a standard stop on this excursion during the times of the year when they are around (neither our guide nor the First Choice rep told us exactly what their migration patterns are).  Elise got to practice her developing photo skills.

I got a kick out of the unique shapes of the horns on the goats.  These two fellows were having at it when we drove up.  Unfortunately they refused to cooperate with my desire for a fight on camera.

I was also interested in the hounds, which were decently sized.  It turns out they are a breed called Kangal, which is unique to Turkey (more on that here).  They guard the flocks from predators like wolves, but they don't actively herd them.  Hence these two guys lying down in the middle of the goats who are paying no attention to them.  Very not border collie-ish.

Our other stop on the mountain was at this little waterfall.

Obligatory family photo in beautiful location.

That eager smile of Elise's that I mentioned?  Here it is, turned into a yell of exhilaration as the driver took us at moderate speeds over bumpy bits in the road and through some standing puddles.

Our last stop of the morning was at a little village cafe.  The girls were starting to feel a bit weary by now.  Elise grabbed some alone time on the front / bonnet / hood of our Land Rover.

They cheered up a bit when our driver brought out a baby tortoise to handle (although note the not-so-satisifed little one in the background).

Kristine and I each sampled the Turkish coffee.  We got the proper tourist price of 4 euros per cup.

Mid-day weariness was reflected in trying to rest for the last bit of the drive off the mountain.

And then again when we got onto the boat.

The boat had a charcoal grill on the bow.  One of the crew members got the charcoal going as we left the harbor.  Part way into the cruise he put fish on the grill to make our lunch.  That's our hotel in the background.

The girls picked up energy through the afternoon once they had some food in their systems.  It helped that for parts of the trip we had other boats to watch.

I was a little ambivalent about swimming in the ocean since it was a mild day.  Thanks to Elise's persistence though, we decided to give it a go.  I discovered after jumping in off the ladder from the boat that the water was truly brisk.

A benefit of being in brisk ocean water off a boat instead of on the beach is that you get completely submerged.  This gives your body a much better chance of adjusting to the water.  Upon adjustment, being able to swim off the back of the boat turns out to be pretty fun.

Which means your expression can turn from agony (photo above) to a smile when your daughter jumps in after you.

Charis watched Elise and I, and decided she wanted in on the action as well.  She got to jump in when the boat made its final stop for the day before heading back to the harbor.

Family Trip: Turkey (the trip and the hotel)

Our trip to Turkey begins about a year earlier.  I was discussing a potential move to the UK that January with a couple of skeptical daughters who didn't want to leave their friends during the middle of the school year.  At one point during the discussion I pulled up a map of the US and Europe on the iPad.  I explained that I wasn't promising we would move to the UK, but if we did, it would involve a short plane flight from Indianapolis to Newark, and then a long plane flight across the ocean to the UK.  Elise looked at the map and realized that the UK was much closer to Greece than the US.  That changed the value proposition for her, as her 3rd grade class in the US was studying ancient Greece at the time.

Daddy, if we move to the UK, then we could go visit Greece!  Okay, I've decided I want to go.

When we were on the ground in Derby a couple months later, I mentioned this story to a colleague who had recently moved to Derby from Turkey to join the same group I was in.  He suggested that if we wanted to visit ancient Greece, we should consider going to Turkey instead.  He offered several reasons for this, among them that the ruins of ancient Greece are in modern day Turkey, Turkey is more economical to travel to, and you can always get a boat ride across the Aegean Sea if you still want to visit Greece.

Kristine and I were planning on doing one large (e.g., not staying with friends or going to a cabin where we self-cater) trip while we are over here.  We decided that ancient Greece made a lot of sense given its role in thawing Elise's opinion about moving to the UK, and that Turkey made a lot of sense given my colleague's comments about seeing ancient Greece.  Courtesy of First Choice Travel Holidays, we found an economical all-inclusive trip for the October half-term school break.

Our July trip to the US involved a missing passport.  Our August trip to Germany involved a 3:30 am wakeup call, only to find a completely packed airport at 5:30.  This mixed (at best) experience at the Birmingham Airport gave me some apprehension about making the departure.  Much to my surprise, all the airport logistics went very smoothly.

The parking lot was considerably less packed this time, which I don't completely understand since it was the Saturday before a week-long half-term holiday.

Clare was thrilled about pulling her own suitcase through the airport.  We were thrilled that she's getting big enough to pull her own suitcase through the airport.

Those black dots she was walking over?  I wondered what their purpose was.  It turns out they are an excellent way of helping squirly kids not run around.  All you do is tell them to follow the trail of dots.

Charis took advantage of the peaceful daylight flight to (re)read Pippi Longstocking.

Charis's willingness to spend so much time reading meant that Clare got the iPad for most of the flight.  This meant Clare was cheerful, which also meant Kristine, as the parent assigned to sit next to her on the outgoing flight, had a good flight.

Our flight with Thomson Airways took us into the airport in Izmir.  We stayed at the Onyria Claros hotel, which was about a 45 min drive south, just outside of Ozdere, and across the bay from Kusadasi.

We were in one of the villas, about a 5 minute walk from the main hotel.

With a lovely view of the ocean.

Which not everyone enjoyed all the time.  In Clare's defense, this was the morning after we arrived at the hotel close to midnight the previous night.

The distance from the main hotel meant we did quite a bit of walking.  Or, in the girls' case, running.

The hotel cafeteria had a decent buffet of foods for each meal.  The quantity and variety of olives took some getting used to.

One of us wished that the cheese and sausage platters were available at more than just breakfast (my wife and daughters were not so appreciative).

We all enjoyed the fruit.

And the dessert.

Truly, we enjoyed the dessert (chocolate on pancakes counts as dessert in my book, even if it's at breakfast).

I mentioned the olives, right?

Despite it being the last week of October, the weather was decently mild.  This meant we generally ate breakfast and lunch on the balcony.

Or, more importantly, were able to knit on the balcony.

I realized part way through the week that the girls have had very little exposure to real beaches (no, Connecticut in August doesn't count).  This trip was a great opportunity to rectify that missing experience.  We did the obligatory "bury someone in sand" activity.  To her credit, this was Elise's idea.

The girls labored valiantly to build sand structures that might withstand the onslaught of the waves.

The mild weather meant we could generally use the ocean as a way to clean off.  The mild weather also meant the ocean wasn't really warm enough to spend tons of time playing in.

Apologies for the fuzzy picture here.  I had great fun playing volleyball one morning.  I think we had three nationalities between the five of us (American, German, and ??).  It was the first time I've played in many years.  Something my gimpy knee reminded me of by aching for a long time afterwards.  That notwithstanding, it was fun to revive dormant muscle memories.  And for the record, despite what my brothers might say, this photo captures a brilliant set.

The hotel had several outdoor pools.  The water was actually colder in the pools than in the ocean.  Despite the cold temperatures, the girls were able to convince Kristine to join them a couple of times.

  

Although the cold temperatures did mean recovery time like this.

Part way through the week we figured out where the indoor pool was.  This greatly improved our fun playing in the water.  We would play on the beach from after lunch until about 3 pm when the temperature dropped and the girls turned purple.  Then we'd rinse off in the ocean and head to the indoor pool for another hour or so of water fun.

Somewhat to my surprise, the girls got into mini-golf.

I'm sure this pose reflects great skill and concentration.

On our last day at the hotel, most of the recreational equipment was closed down because the tourist season was wrapping up.  To kill time, we took the girls to the hotel amphitheater (it wasn't used at all the week we were there, but I gather it's a lot more active during the busier times of the year).  Here's Clare performing Frozen, and flinging her arms wide for emphasis on Let it go.

Charis performed a little ditty about beans that she learned at school

Saturday night saw us back at the airport in Izmir for a 9 pm flight to Birmingham.  With a couple of very tired daughters (and one who cheerfully stayed up reading on the 4 hr flight, and then fell asleep in the car before we were out of the Birmingham airport).