ANTALYA · TURKEY
Turquoise bays, old harbours, mountain canyons.
Boat trips along the Turquoise Coast, white water in Köprülü Canyon and the old town of Kaleïçi. Day trips to Side, Pamukkale and the Taurus, all from one base on the Mediterranean.
Only here
Only on this stretch of the Turkish coast.
Boat trips and beaches turn up all along the Mediterranean. The canyon rafting, the emerald lake and the sea-to-summit cable car belong to these mountains and this coast alone.
Under a Roman bridge
Koprulu Canyon Rafting
An hour inland, the Koprulu river runs cold and fast through a gorge in the Taurus, still crossed by a Roman bridge two thousand years old. This is the white-water capital of Turkey, and the run through the national park is the one nearly everyone books from the coast.
- 1 Antalya: Ziplining, Rafting, Jeep Tour & Quad Safari w/Lunch
- 2 Antalya: Rafting & Buggy, Quad Safari & Zipline Adventure
- 3 Köprülü Canyon Antalya: Whitewater Rafting Trip
The emerald lake
Green Canyon by Boat
Behind the Oymapinar dam, the Manavgat river backs up into a deep green reservoir walled in by canyon cliffs. Boats drift the still water past springs cold enough to swim in, with trout lunches and not a wave in sight. A fjord with no sea, deep in the mountains.
- 1 Side: Jeep Safari Adventure with Lunch at Green Lake
- 2 Side: Green Canyon Boat Trip & Bus Safari with Lunch
- 3 Green Canyon Jeep and Boat Tour with Lunch
Sea to summit
The Tahtali Cable Car
A gondola climbs Tahtali, the ancient Mount Olympos, from near sea level to a 2,365-metre summit in about ten minutes. The whole Turquoise Coast unrolls below, the Lycian Way threads the slopes, and the air at the top stays cool while the beach bakes far underneath.
- 1 Antalya/Kemer: Old City, Waterfalls, Olympos Cable Car, Boat
- 2 Antalya Luxury Old Town Tour with Cable Car & Boat Trip
- 3 Antalya/Kemer: City Tour w/Olympos Cable Car, Boat & Lunch
Start with the standout
If you only book one big day out.
More travellers build their Antalya trip around this one day than anything else on the coast.
The classics
Antalya's Most Popular Tours
Suluada, Pamukkale, Köprülü Canyon and the old town. The days most people come to Antalya for.
Where to begin
The days an Antalya trip is built around.
The boat trips, the white-water canyon, the old town, the waterfalls, the mountain safaris and the run inland to Pamukkale. The handful of days most trips are planned around, and the best way to do each.
On the water
Which boat trip is your kind of day?
The coast runs on boat days, and they are not the same day. Turquoise islands, an emerald canyon lake, or a lazy river up to a waterfall. Pick the water you want.
Kaleïçi
Two thousand years around one harbour.
The old town tips down a hillside to a Roman harbour, a maze of carved wooden houses, leaning minarets and Hadrian’s Gate, the marble arch the emperor walked through in 130 AD. At the city’s edge the Düden falls drop straight off the cliff into the sea.
Read the guide: the best old town & city tours →The hammam
Steam, marble and a cold plunge.
The Turkish bath is older than the resorts and outlasts every trend. You sweat on a heated marble slab under a domed ceiling pricked with little stars of light, get scrubbed and foamed head to toe, then drop into cold water and lie still. The oldest spa day on the coast.
See the Turkish baths & spas →The coast
Where the mountains meet the sea.
This is the Turquoise Coast: the Taurus range dropping straight into a Mediterranean so clear it runs green over the rocks. Ancient harbours and pine-backed beaches strung along the foot of the mountains, a thousand metres of limestone rising right behind the sand.
Boat trips along the coast →Pamukkale
The white terraces, in a day from the coast.
Three hours inland, hot springs spill down a hillside and leave it coated in blinding white travertine, terraced pools of warm turquoise water stepping down the slope. Above them stand the ruins of Hierapolis and the antique pool where you swim among fallen marble columns. A long day, and worth every kilometre.
- 1 Pamukkale Hierapolis and Cleopatra’s Pool Tour with lunch from Antalya
- 2 From Antalya/Kemer: Pamukkale and Hierapolis Tour with Lunch
- 3 From Antalya/Kemer: Pamukkale & Hierapolis Day Trip w/Meals
By intensity
Pick your day, by pace.
The coast does every speed. A marble hammam and a slow boat at one end, a paraglider off a mountain at the other, and the jeep-and-rafting day in between.
Take it slow
Steam, marble and a slow boat.A Turkish bath in a marble hararet, a gentle cruise along the coast, a long lunch with your feet near the water.
Classic adventure
Mountains, canyons and rapids.A jeep safari up into the Taurus, white water through Koprulu Canyon, a quad through the pine forest above the coast.
Off the edge
Straight off the summit.Tandem paragliders off the shoulder of Tahtali, zip lines across the gorge, canyoning down cold mountain water.
Into the Taurus
Off the asphalt and up the mountain.
Open-top jeeps grind up dirt tracks into the Taurus behind the coast, through pine forest and mountain villages to cold rivers and waterfalls, with a mud-splattered run and a long lunch by the water. The Antalya day out for when the beach has had its turn.
See all 31 jeep safaris →Along the coast
Pick a stretch of the coast.
Antalya for the old harbour and the falls. Side for the seafront ruins. Kemer for the pine mountains. Belek for the resorts and golf. Alanya for the castle. Manavgat for the river and the market.
By activity
Or sort the coast by what you're into.
A boat if you want the turquoise water. Rafting if you want white water. A jeep if you want the mountains. The cable car for the view, a hammam for the steam, Pamukkale for the terraces.
Plan it
Three perfect days.
First time on this coast? Here is a long weekend that hits the essentials without a wasted hour.
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