Datça & Loryma, September, 2010
On the evening of Thursday, September 2, 2010, Ayşe and I caught a
bus from Ankara to Datça. I reported on our ensuing holiday by means of
Facebook. However, Facebook does not provide a good way to bring
together, in one place, all of the photos and notes and status
updates
that resulted from our trip. Now, in early 2013, I am
trying to bring those things together on this page.
On Friday morning, September 3, I sent the following status update:
Later in the day, I sent this:Ayşe and I are in Datça now after an overnight 12-hour bus ride from Ankara. Datça is on the peninsula at the tip of which are the ruins of Knidos. Herodotus tells us that the Knidians tried to make their peninsula an island, but during the digging, splinters of stone kept causing injury. The oracle of Delphi told them, If the good Lord had meant the pensinsula to be an island, He would have made it so.
Sitting under an olive tree, we've just had spinach börek at the dolmuş terminal of Datça. In half an hour, one of the minibuses will take us further down the peninsula to a pension on one of the little bays.
Our bus this morning reached the yachting town of Marmaris at 8.00; then it was another hour and a half out to Datça on the peninsula. The road wound around the hills, showing us the sea sometimes on one side, sometimes the other. There was no arable land in sight, just trees and bushes.
The dolmuş from Datça took only four of us from the terminal, but filled up with nine more by the time we were left town. We also took a crate of bread to be dropped at a shop along the way; and some bags of vegetables that turned out to be for our pension.
It was 45 minutes to our pension on a small bay. The road took a lot of switchbacks to get down here. The beach is a strip of course sand. The water is calm and clear. There are farms inland. It's not the most beautiful beach we've seen in Turkey—that was on the island of Tenedos, to which the Greek warriors retreated after leaving the big hollow horse at Troy. The point about where we are now is that it is miles away from anything else. I've brought more books than we shall spend days here.
Our pension was in the locale called Hayıtbükü.
On Saturday morning, I created Datça Peninsula, September 2010, a Facebook photo album: photos, with commentary, from Friday, September 3.
Some time on Saturday, I submitted this update
to Facebook:
Before catching our bus to Datça Thursday night, Ayşe and Ivisited an Ankara bookstore one last time. Somebody else must have bought Ece Temelkuran's book; I had hesitated to buy this import hardback a week earlier, and now it was gone. Then I noticed The Trouble With Islam, by Irshad Manji. This amusing and engaging book is what made me reluctant to sleep on the bus. Addressed to Muslims by a Muslim, the book is harsh, but perhaps not unfair under those circumstances. The author takes a Protestant view: you've gotta decide for yourself the meaning of the Quran. Of course that's right: it's a human duty to use one's brain (though I have taken issue with American Christians who read isolated passages of the Quran in translation and decide they know all they need to know).
Ms Manji ridicules Muslim prejudice against dogs. But I've never seen this prejudice in Turkey. At the dolmuş terminal in Datça yesterday, a dog was sleeping on a chair. Other waiting Turkish passengers found him charming. A beaming man told me he had seen nearby what must have been this dog's puppies.
On Saturday, we walked along the coast to Palamutbükü. I reported on this on Sunday morning with Datça day 2 (Facebook photo album).
We must have taken things easy on Sunday. In any case, I have no photos from that day.
On Monday, we took a boat trip to Knidos, recorded in Datça day 4 (Facebook photo album).
On Tuesday, we hiked around the neighborhood of our pension. I described this in Datça Day 5, a Facebook note. It does not appear that the full-sized photos are available on Facebook, though they should be in Facebook somewhere.
On Wednesday, evidently we just hung around, without taking photos.
On Thursday, we left Hayıtbükü. I wrote Datça Day 6, another Facebook note, about our pension there and our trip to Söğüt via Marmaris.
I counted Thurday as Loryma day 1. Next day, we took a bus tour with four other guests of our new pension: Loryma day 2 (Facebook note).
Saturday we must have taken easy. Sunday, we hiked up to the town of Taşlıca: Loryma day 4 (Facebook note).
On Monday, a shorter hike: Loryma Day 5 (Facebook photo album).
