Day 16: Bodrum

It was another lovely sunny morning when we woke up in Selçuk. We sat outside an enjoyed another Turkish breakfast with the same ingredients as yesterday. The only change today was that they didn't serve us a plate of cucumber and tomato, which was a relief; they'd obviously picked up on the fact that we hadn't eaten any of it yesterday!

After breakfast we packed up our things and made our way towards the final destination of this holiday: Bodrum. It was a drive of around 2.5 hours from Selçuk to Bodrum and quite a scenic journey, driving first of all along the shore of Lake Bafa and then across the Bodrum peninsula.

We weren't officially able to check into our hotel in Bodrum until 3pm, so my plan was to find some parking in the city centre and get lunch. However, driving in Bodrum turned out to be a nightmare. The city is built on steep sloping hills and there's a one-way system in operation around the town centre and marina. Parking isn't signposted in advance in Turkey in the way it is in most European countries, so even though "otopark" is one of the few words we know in Turkish, by the time we'd seen a sign for one of the handful of car parks, we'd already have driven past it.

After failing to find anywhere to park either in the town or by the harbour, we decided to drive straight to the hotel instead and try our luck there. The hotel did have a reasonable-sized car park at least, so we pulled up there and went to reception. The good news was that our room was already ready and they were happy to let us check in a bit early

And it turned out to be a really nice place. We've got a big living area...

...with a kitchen...

...plus a separate bedroom.

But the best bit is definitely the balcony!

We've got a fantastic view of this beautiful bit of the Turkish coast.

The hotel is on a bit of a hill outside the centre of Bodrum, so once we'd unpacked the essentials we set off downhill towards the town centre. On the way, I caught sight of something I hadn't expected on the hillside.

You'll struggle to make it out in the photo above unless you really zoom in, but here's a close-up.

I thought that was pretty cool; it reminded me of our trip to Brașov in 2019!

Once we got down to sea level, we got our first glimpse of Bodrum Castle on the opposite side of the harbour.

We walked along the city's seaside promenade, looking for somewhere to get lunch.

On the way, we passed one of the city's many mosques.

We chose a restaurant where we almost had a view of the sea, although it was somewhat blocked out by some of the large boats in the harbour.

After experimenting with Turkish food yesterday, we were less adventurous today and both opted for a chicken schnitzel.

After lunch we continued around the sea front, trying to get a better view of the castle.

We were just on time to hear the call to prayer being played from the loudspeakers on a couple of the city centre minarets. We've heard it from a distance a few times but it's really loud when you're right by the minaret!

In the centre of town we found what we think was a monument commemorating Atatürk.

This looked like it might be a war memorial, engraved with names and dates.

There was also a huge Bodrum sign

Eventually we made it around to the castle.

It turned out it was actually more impressive from a distance and it was difficult to get a sense of how big it was from close up.

At this point we turned around and began to retrace our steps to the apartment, with a brief stop at a supermarket to pick up some supplies for tonight. We walked back along the main coastal road, where all the trees are in beautiful patterned pots.

One featured chickens...

...while another had some really cool cats  

Once back at the apartment I realised that from our balcony we could see Bodrum's windmills, built in the 18th century.

As night began to fall we had a fantastic view of the sunset from our balcony too.

The colours never seem to come out as brightly in photographs as they look in real life, but it was really beautiful.

Even once the sun had disappeared behind the mountains, the colours in the sky were superb.

It was a perfect end to what has been an amazing holiday