Explore The Mediterranean coast and the Hatay
Heading east from Alanya, the road starts to cut through the mountains, traversing occasional valleys planted with bananas but rarely losing sight of the sea. On the way, you’ll pass little wayside restaurants, sheltered but difficult to reach sandy bays, and the odd camping ground. To make the most of this stretch of coastline you really need your own transportas only the beaches around the tiny resort of İSKELE (Anamur) merit a longer stay, and the few sights are difficult to reach by public transport.
There’s little of interest in Anamur, but its small harbour suburb, İskele (İskele means quay), 4km away, is slowly developing as a fully fledged, but unpretentious resort, packed in summer with holidaying Turks. İskele’s small museum, just west of the town centre, contains some fine Yörük kilims and saddlebags, and finds from nearby classical sites, best of which is a Hellenistic-era cylindrical pottery burial-cask.
Moving on, there are a couple of quiet bays with sandy beaches, but most people push straight on to the scruffy port of TAŞUCU, from where there are frequent ferry and hydrofoil services to Cyprus. Crossing the next day is the only reason you would choose to stay the night here, though the Amphora Museum, set in a restored han behind the quay, has a fascinating collection of amphorae of Hellenistic, Roman and Byzantine origin, mostly from locally salvaged wrecks.
About 10km east of Taşucu, SILIFKE was once ancient Seleucia, founded by Seleucus, one of Alexander the Great’s generals, in the third century BC. Nowadays, it’s a quiet, fairly undistinguished town. Only the occasional tourist, en route to the ruins at Uzuncaburç, passes through.
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