the lycian way - likya yolu - TURKEY

If you’re looking at heading to Greece or Turkey but want to avoid the normal travel experience this could be the thing for you. Ruby and I recently hiked a three nights of the Lycian Way from Ölüdeniz to Patara beach above the Aegean Sea. It’s an old Lycian trading route it was a refreshing experience filled with good sort locals, good and cheap food and easy living. It felt more like what you would expect to see in the Greek Islands and a far cry from my expectations of Turkey.

While planning the trip things seemed complicated. Once we got started we realised you could mostly make up your plans on the fly. Pretty much just pack a tent, your hiking gear, a couple of water bottles (crucial as most of the wells dry up over the warmer months), and cash monies and you are good to go. There are plenty of good places to eat along the way. Every hour or so you’ll come across a place to pitch your tent, all with amazing views perched amongst old olive groves. Because of this we made sure we had supplies for cooking a meal or two between villages.

Apparently in the summer months the heat is brutal. We were lucky and managed to get a good weather window in April, from what we heard the fringe seasons of summer are good.

OSMAnd Maps app is the go to with free offline maps, we used this more than expected along the trail as there were numerous alternative routes and goat tracks. There is cell signal most of the way along, with a few black spots here and there.

Our one regret of the journey was deciding to take the alternative coastal route between Farala and Kabak. Although we got bloody good views down the Butterfly Valley, we expected we would be able to swim along the way. Much of this route is now heavily developed with many large construction sites and property blocking the trail. The beach was “closed” and we were unable to reach the water the rest of the way along.

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