Moving from San Francisco to New York - via Taipei,
Bangkok, Vietnam, Laos,
Cambodia, India, Nepal,
Turkey, Greece, Portugal,
Spain, Scotland, and
London.
The Blue Lagoon - or Ölüdeniz - is simply gorgeous. You wouldn't know it by my lack of photos * but trust me it is beautiful! It is really just a small bay off the Mediterranean Sea - but it is crystal clear blue - not an ounce of seaweed in it - you can see right to the bottom!! We stayed for just one night there because our final destination * Butterfly Valley * was closed. By 'closed' I mean that there are no roads, and if the waves are too high for the zodiac or come and retrieve you frmo the Blue Lagoon, one must repel down the face of a mtn. (read: that means 'closed' !!)
Ýn the morning after soaking up some rays at the Blue Lagoon we got in for a bumpy ride on the zodiac captained by 2 extremely nice hippies. The valley is an extreme valley with faces of cliffs on either side of the beach and about a half mile behind the beach.
We opted for a tent on the beach versus the wood huts ("no bug problems in the huts, but the only thing is is that the chickens sometimes come in") and were the only tourists there with the 8 guys who worked there getting ready for the season. In the morning I hiked up to the waterfall and Utkus flute playing freaked out the mountain goats - a good laugh!
as we were contemplating our next move we saw a big sightseeing boat pull up * one of the ones that take you on a day long tour and have a water slide * anyway we wound up hitching a ride on that and for only $3 more than the return zodiac trip would have been - we got to tour the area by boat, eat fresh fish, and use the waterslide!
The next day we headed to Patara - the birthplace of Saint Nicholas. Having been raised in North Pole Alaska, I could not resist!! The only trouble was that the bus dropped us after dark 6 km from the village * but somehow things always seem to work out. We were picked up and given a ride to the village * stayed at a great pension. The men of the village were hanging out outside our pension and invited Utku to play the Saz (like a guitar) and we were set * they loved him!
The next day we started the walk back to the main road to continue on to Antalya .... within minutes were picked up by 2 men and their fatherç
6 votes 
