Ephesus and Selcuk, Turkey

We flew from Athens to Izmir, Turkey as our visa time inside the Shengen zone was up. From Izmir, we had arranged a car shuttle to our hotel in the town of Selcuk.

our hotel room view in Selcuk, Turkey

sunset flight from Athens to Izmir

aquaduct in Selcuk

We spent three nights in Selcuk and really enjoyed our stay at the AirBnb (Centrum hotel, host's name Mehmet). It was nice to have 3 nights cost $175 Canadian at this place and get amazing service with friendly staff. We woke to the 'call for prayer' from the Mosque across the street before 7am, and enjoyed this call as it came out across the town 5 times per day.

One of the best things about the town of Selcuk was the small restaurant called 'Ali Babba's'. Ali Babba is Mehmet's brother. Ali Babba's wife made us Turkish pancakes and freshly squeezed orange juice in front of us. Plus, we could watch the FIFA soccer matches on the tv while we ate and Ali Babba spoke to us with his strong English. 

Ali Babba drove us up the road to the entrance of Ephesus the next day. Ephesus is a very old (Roman) city with amazing ruins. Despite feeling like we have seen a lot of ancient ruins, this still impressed us and we enjoyed our visit. Also, there were other tourists there and several bus groups, but it was lovely to visit such a beautiful and popular tourist attraction without huge crowds that are often here at other times of year.

the toilets

Hadrian's Library - very impressive!

We walked back from the lower exit gate toward town so that we could go to the Temple of Artemis on the way. The Temple of Artemis is one of the 7 ancient wonders of the world. There's only one pillar still standing from what used to be a large pillared temple, so it's not much to see. But there's a geocache there and it's still pretty cool to be at such a renowned place. Also, there's a huge bird's nest on top of the pillar now, which we really enjoyed.

The next day it poured with rain, but we managed to catch a weather break long enough to go explore the local castle. This is a combination of Turkish mosque ruins / Christian history / walled castle. St. John allegedly accompanied the Virgin Mary to this area and preached there for many years. The basilica was built to honour him and his tomb is there. (We didn't go to see the house of Mary, which is a few minutes outside of town.) But the ruins and castle here were still interesting to see.

This giant mound of brick used to be a curved roof topping of the basilica

We also had some down time here to do some work and school while it rained. Most people probably would only go to Ephesus on a day trip from somewhere else, or perhaps spend only 1 night in Selcuk, but we took longer since we are in winter / remote travel / remote school world and can't keep up with the travel pace that comes with a true vacation and warmer weather.

A couple of our favorite phrases have emerged from Greece and Turkey:

1) "Open Every Day" - something we read on many signs, websites, and brochures on the Greek Islands. It turns out that 'every day' means 'every day that we are open', which tends to be every day from April-October and then closed every day from Nov-March.

2) "We Have Everything" - we heard this a little bit in Greece and are hearing it a lot in Turkey. It's part of the sales pitch to get you to come into a store or into a restaurant, even if half the items on the menu aren't available that day or are only available in the summer.

3) "Yes. Everything is Perfect." - a way of a host encouraging you to think that their place / restaurant / store / whatever is perfect, even if you might notice several things that could be improved :)