Have you ever been on holiday to Turkey?
One of our Customer Advisers, Laura, recently visited and shares her experience of a holiday in Olu Deniz, Turkey…
“After booking time off from work, my boyfriend and I decided that we wanted to spend those days somewhere sunny. We gave up looking on the internet and went to Thomas Cook to see if they could help. We settled on Turkey as we had both been there before. The travel agent recommended Olu Deniz as somewhere we might enjoy as it was a relaxing area with a famous lagoon and a completely different area to where we had both previously been.
With our bags packed we headed to Stansted, and boarded the flight incredibly nervously (I am not the biggest fan of flying). It wasn’t a good flight. There was an almighty lightning storm over Dalaman and the pilot had to drop rapidly to avoid the clouds and lightning. At this point you can imagine as a nervous flyer I was not in a good way and I admit that I spent the descent in tears while the lady next to us proceeded to reassure me with stories of all the difficult landings she had been through successfully. It didn’t help.
The hotel was called The Asena Beach. It was lovely and highly recommended on review websites. The rooms aren’t massive but well maintained with a balcony. We were staying half-board so breakfast and dinner were included. The food was tasty with a range of Turkish and English food on offer. The resort was on the beach front, with a range of restaurants, cocktail bars and tourist shops. We spent many an evening in Captain Hook’s cocktail bar. Cocktails were incredible and only 10TL, which works out to be about £3.50!
We spent one day at the Blue Lagoon, there was a charge of 5TL to enter. From the shore it wasn’t impressive but we rented a Pedalo boat and once in the middle of the Lagoon you could see how amazing the place was. We took a Dolmus (local bus) to Fethiye, the nearby main town to see the massive market. It was exhausting! The idea in Turkey when you’re interested in buying something is to haggle the price with the seller before purchasing.
We went on a local boat day trip (always shop around locally) to 6 beaches and islands. The day included lunch and stops at each beach or island so that you could swim in the sea, wander round some ruins or hike to a waterfall. Highly recommended!
On our last day, we booked a departure trip with lunch and dinner provided, through Thomas Cook, as our flight home was at 4am on the Saturday but we had to check out by midday on the Friday. I would recommend booking this trip if you have a late night flight or an early morning one! This trip was to Dalyan and consisted of a mud-bath, which stank but was great fun, then a boat trip down the Dalyan River to view the Kaunos Tombs and then to Turtle Beach where locals were baiting crabs to attract wild Turtles to the surface of the water for you to see. At the end of this trip, we were put up in a hotel until our flight back home to cold but surprisingly sunny England at 6am. Needless to say that the flight home was far less dramatic!”
By Laura Cropper
Would you consider a holiday here? Tell us why or why not in the comments box below!
