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Paul, the owner of the Crowded House hotel and his staff were just fantastic. They made us feel welcome as soon as we arrived and everything was 'no worries mate' in a mixed up Aussie, Kiwi,Turkish accent. He was a real character, and had only just opened the Kiwi/Aussie hostel this year. We would totally recommend anyone stay there, and we wish him every success. Paul organised our bus tickets to Selcuk,our next destination and even escorted us to the bus and made sure we got on with no problems. Well no sooner had we boarded the bus and we had already caused a commotion. We had designated seat numbers on our tickets and of course people were already sitting in our seats. Guy tried to explain to the people in our seats, but they didn't speak any English or they were secretly hoping we would just go away. After a bit of pointing at seats and ticket shaking by Guy we did in deed give up and sit in two vacant seats at the back of bus, but of course we were sitting in someone else's seats as everyone had allocated seats and they were just about to approach us. Thankfully they spoke both English and Turkish and rectified the situation - phew!! At this point we were only 10 minutes into our 7 hour bus trip, what else could happen - Dr Pepper anyone??
So far we have been so impressed with the services on the buses. Ok, so it's not a four course meal, but the snack of cake and coffee has been greatly appreciated by us, if not to ward off the hunger pains but to also alleviate the boredom of the long bus rides - remember we only have one pack of cards for entertainment. Mind you our bus journeys have been fairly entertaining so far that we haven't managed to get a single came of last card in yet. Shannene seems to have acquired a taste for the coffee that they serve on the buses. As she is normally a tea drinker we're not really sure if it's the 3 in 1 powdered coffee/milk/sugar that she likes the taste of or if it's the entertainment factor that it brings watching the host/hostess maneouver through the aisle with a pot of boiling hot water filling everyone's cup up without spilling a drop. Or actually trying to drink the hot coffee without burning yourself on a very bouncy bus - much like being in really bad turbulence on a plane. Highly amusing.
We arrived bleary eyed in Selcuk at 6:30am. Paul the owner of the hotel in Eceabat had thankfully phoned ahead and booked us into the ANZ (Australia & New Zealand) hostel. We were greeted by Harry, who strangely had a very strong Aussie accent, but was infact Turkish, and led us to our room - in which we can only describe as the honeymoon suite, complete with plastic roses on the bed and a small balcony. We had a couple hours kip and then had breakfast on the roof terrace under a nomad tent. We were very excited to have muesli, yoghurt and fresh fruit for breakfast - a welcome change to the usual Turkish breakfast of cheese, tomato, cucumber, olives, boiled egg and bread. Never have we eaten so many boiled eggs and bread as we have on this trip.
After breakfast the hostel arranged for us and another Kiwi couple to be dropped off at the top entrance of Ephesus (but not before we had a look around their carpet and souvenir shop). We managed to come away without buying anything,it's such a shame we don't have room in our backpacks as the handmade plates, dishes and tea sets are just beautiful. Guy really loves the carpets and kilims,I'm sure if we had the space we'd have two by now!
Ephesus is one of the most preserved Roman ruins, the library and ampi-theatre were most impressive. It's such a shame it was so mobbed by tour groups - ruddy tourists they always seem to walk past just as you are about to take that perfect photo!! When we got to the end we still had a bit of time to kill before we were being picked up, so we went for a bit of a walk away from the crowds and in search of some shade. Two guys on a motorbike drove slowly past us asking us if were interested in ancient coins, they had just discovered some today at Ephesus. We saw right through their scam, plus we'd already read about it in our guidebook. They are infact recent coins made to look old. They were fairly harmless characters, we said no thanks and they were on their way to the next unsuspecting tourist, who knows they may get lucky and actually sell them. Once we got back to our hostel, we decided to check out the local markets. The fruit and veg looked so fresh and the colours were just amazingly bright and vibrant. None of this ripen in the fruit bowl like you get at our supermarkets, this fruit and veg had probably been picked fresh from the fields that morning. We bought some peaches, the most juicest and tastiest we've ever had. That evening we dined at the Old House Restaurant (a Lonely Planet recommendation). It had tables set in a little courtyard amongst grapefruit and pomegrante trees and decorated with lanterns, bird cages and wicker chairs. It did really tasty Turkish food, Guy had the speciality 'Old House Kebap' served on a sizzling platter. The next morning after a huge bowl of muesli we joined a tour group to Pamukkale to see the ruins of Hierapolis and Pamukkale which is famous for its calcium travetines - very similar to the pink and white terraces in NZ. The region around Pamukkale is the natural spa centre of Turkey and the water is suppose to cure every ailment. People used to bathe in the clear blue water on the sparkling white travertines, however tourism has damaged it in the days before conservation and now there are only a few ridges that you can paddle your feet in, the rest you can only view from a distance and don't contain that much water. After a quick paddle in the water and giggling at the wanna be super models posing like tigers with their blue steel looks in the water we were back on the bus heading for Fethiye still in search of the sea and beaches.
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