A day of leisure

My darling husband was not a very happy chappy this morning. At around 4:30am he discovered that our hotel room was right outside a mosque minaret and that the loudspeaker was pointed right at our hotel window. How did he discover this? 4:30am happened to be the first call to prayer of the day. Andrew described it as an alarm clock with no snooze button. Thankfully I must have been in a deeper sleep than him as I did not hear a sound :-)

Knowing that Antalya (pronounced Ahn-ta-lee-ya)was going to be very hot, our tour guide had suggested that we make our visit to Aspendos earlier than the scheduled time and that we forego our outdoor lunch. Already sweltering in the heat, we were all happy to agree.

So at 8am we all piled into the bus and drove to the ruins of another ancient city, Aspendos. What made the ruins of this city extra special was the fact that the amphitheatre is almost completely intact and is even still in use for plays and operas. This is one of the few remaining amphitheatres in the world that are still in such good condition.

Climbing the stairs to the top of the amphitheatre was vertigo inducing as the angles are steep and there are no hand rails. The theatre was designed in a specific way to ensure excellent acoustics.

Next we headed back to Antalya to visit the archaeological museum. This museum contained some excellent sculptures and sarcophagi retreived from the ruins of Aspendos and another nearby ancient city Perge (pronounced Purr-gay).

The rest of the day was left to us to do as we pleased. The first thing on the list for all the women of the tour was washing! As this was the first time in a while where we were staying at the same place for two nights, we had the ability to wash our clothes and ensure they dried.

After doing the washing, Andrew and I went for a stroll through the old section of Antalya. There are still a few items remaining from the old fortified city including a clock tower and some of the fortification walls. We also went for a stroll down to the seashore via the markets.

Market vendors hassled us all the way down and back up again such that even though I had wanted to buy something from the markets, I felt so annoyed that I refused to do so. Feeling hot and bothered we decided to take a dip in the pool at the hotel. Very refreshing!