So far my trip through Turkey had been a whirlwind of travelling, tourist attraction visiting and doing copious amounts of eating. So as K and I headed south towards the coast, I was keen for a few days of being a lazy ass and slothing it out on the beach.
We arrived into Bodrum around 1:30pm and made our way to Bodrum Backpackers, our accommodation for the next few nights. Bodrum Backpackers is surprisingly the only backpackers hostel in Bodrum, and they do their darnedest to make sure travellers get cheap accommodation. This may mean sleeping on the couch out on the deck or flooring it with a spare mattress, but if they can squeeze you in they will! We walked in and there were bags everywhere, phones charging at every spare outlet and writing all over the walls. It looked like a 20-somethings flat, who had about 50 friends crash for the weekend. There were two Scots running the joint, who welcomed us in like old pals and we were shown our room. Somehow despite booking the double room, K and I ended up in a single room, with a spare mattress for the floor. A little apprehensive, we YOLO-ed (sorry, but we really did) and shoved our stuff in the shoebox sized room, put on our swimmers and made a beeline for the beach.
Bodrum, was to put it nicely – nothing like what I expected. We were told it was a chilled out little beach town, so I had visions of a place similar to Byron Bay or even one of the Gili Islands off Lombok. But no, Bodrum was equivalent to say, Thailand’s Patong Beach or Kuta in Bali. The beach was lined with beach chairs occupied by slowly darkening Euros, the shops sold tacky souvenirs and fake Dre Beats and fake Converse and the restaurants boasted about their ‘Full English Breakfast’ or ‘All day cocktails!’ There seemed nothing Turkish about the place at all, except the currency. Though I will admit, I wasn’t overly fussed – I just wanted some sun and salty water.
We made a perch at Cafe Del Mar, which was the regular jaunt for Backpacker Bodrum guests. After finding a lounge we raced for the water and splashed about the the remarkably clear water. We spent the afternoon between swimming, reading and chatting with other people from the hostel who had joined us. With every intention of checking out a bit more of Bodrum, we ended up spending the entire afternoon lazing about. And to be totally honest, it was perfect.
Around 5:30pm we packed up and had a look around the streets in search of a (very) late lunch. We managed to find a Turkish kebab place which was tasty, but nothing compared to the food we had been eating in other places. Heading back to the hostel for a shower, we booked a boat cruise for the following day and had a few drinks at the hostel bar, chatting with other travellers (predominately Aussie of course) until retired to bed, tired and red.
The following morning we woke up and sought out some breakfast as the hostel didn’t offer any. We had until 10:30am until our boat cruise started so we wandered the streets, looking at all the shops before making our way to the cruise harbour where we would take off from.
For just 30TL, we were taken around five different coves and swimming spots, given lunch and an entire top deck to sun bake on. Deal of the trip – abso-freaking-lutely! The day was utter loveliness. K and I sunbaked, swam, read, napped and just enjoyed the fun of sailing.
I can’t emphasise how much you should do a gulet cruise in Turkey. Its the best way to see the beauty of the Turkish coastline, and it’s a day of total relaxation. I won’t go into too much detail, well because theres no much to tell. You sail, swim and relax. How much more convincing do you need!? More? Okay, heres’s some photos to tempt you..
We docked back in Bodrum around 5-ish and took our sunburnt, relaxed bodies straight back to the hostel. Its surprising how tiring doing nothing can be! We stayed up for awhile chatting with new travellers who had arrived (more Aussies) before calling it a night, ready for our next spontaneous adventure.
Stay tuned for where we are randomly heading next!
J. x
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