It is, perhaps, slightly off the beaten track, this ancient ruin at Olympos. With no four or five star hotels in sight, the atmosphere could perhaps be best described as summer-camp-for-grownups. Hammocks and cushion-lined booths dominate the scene,
and a dirt road (periodically crossed by a dry riverbed) leads sun-burnt travelers through Cair Paravel-like ruins to the pebbled beach.
At some point during Greco-Roman times, this was a fairly important city, with a bath, a theatre, a port, and a couple necropolises. Perhaps because of pirates, or perhaps because of earthquakes, or perhaps because of some other combination of reasons, the city went into decline. Now the mostly unexcavated remains are overgrown and mainly visited by Europeans and Turks seeking a holiday but not wanting to pay resort prices.
It's a great place to explore and to imagined among the ruins, without the aid of archaeological constructions (or misconstructions), what life might have been like.
And one can understand why pirates seemed to prefer the place.
Now the most ruthless inhabitants are the chickens which parade around regularly, crowing and cackling and searching for bugs and stray crumbs.
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| This one seems like he could be a reincarnated pirate :) |
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