On the trip
Hierapolis and Pamukkale
Friday 23 October, on the way to Selçuk. No overnight here.
On our trip
- Susan Beans, John, and Susan Stevenson. Jill’s car to Dalaman is 07:00, $80, for TK 2555 at 10:25. She does not continue.
- Hired car with driver collects us at Unsal at 08:00, Unsal → Pamukkale → Selçuk, $440 cash, about $147 each. About 3 hours to Pamukkale (~11:00), 2.5–3 hours at Hierapolis, Akanthus around 17:00. Elvira has the hotel address. Driver contact still TBC.
- The driver cannot take the car to the gate. Elvira’s drop-off and entrance are two pins. A taxi covers the five-minute gap.
- Pamukkale / Hierapolis is about €30, card OK at the window, covering the terraces, the ancient city, and the museum. Not in the cash total.
- From 1 October, winter hours: walking route typically 08:00–17:00; entrances 08:00–18:00. Go early.
- Night is Akanthus in Selçuk, not here. Check-in from 14:00. David lands Izmir at 19:00. Elvira has his name, the flight, and the hotel address.
This is a road day that happens to contain one of the most famous places in the country. We are not staying. Jill leaves Ölüdeniz for the airport at seven. The three of us take Elvira’s hired car toward Selçuk and stop at Pamukkale on the way. David is still in the air until evening. Do not wait for him, and do not plan lunch around a fourth person.
Pamukkale is the white. Hierapolis is the city on top of the white. The terraces are travertine: hot spring water, heavy with calcium, has been spilling down the plateau and leaving stone behind. The pools are shallow and bright. The city above is a Greek and then Roman spa town — people came for the water, and the necropolis outside the walls is enormous because people also came to die near the water, or at least to be buried by a famous spring. The theatre and the main street are the readable parts of the city. The museum is included in the €30 our page quotes, along with the terraces and the ancient city.
Our page does not mention the antique pool, the one where you swim among sunken column drums. That swim is often a separate ticket. Do not assume it is inside the €30. If we want it, ask at the gate and pay it as its own thing.
Walk the terraces barefoot, on the posted route. The white is the site; shoes and wandering off the path are how it turns grey. In October the light is fine and the crowds are thinner than in summer, but the winter clock is already in force. The walking route is typically done by 17:00, entrances by 18:00. We leave Unsal at 08:00, reach the terraces around 11:00, and have 2.5–3 hours before the car continues to Selçuk.
Logistics that will actually go wrong if we ignore them: the car stops short of the gate. Use Elvira’s drop-off pin and entrance pin. The taxi between them is about five minutes. Build that into the stop, then get back in the same car and continue to Selçuk. Akanthus check-in starts at 14:00. This is one long day in the same seats, with one walk in the middle.