Essential Side Alanya excursions and holiday tricks and tips: If you’re staying in Antalya, the Perge, Aspendos, Side tour offers an excellent way to tick off the highlights of this area’s sights all in one day, including Side’s Temples of Apollo and Athena. This full-day tour includes a guided visit to some of the surrounding region’s major tourist attractions. As well as a stop in Side, it includes visits to Aspendos, to see Turkey’s famous mammoth Roman theater, and the ruins of Perge. It includes lunch, and transport, with pickup and drop-off from your hotel. Side’s huge theater was the largest in ancient Pamphylia and could accommodate an audience of 15,000 in its 49 rows of seating. Although several of the supporting arches have collapsed, bringing down part of the auditorium, this is still a remarkable surviving example of Roman architectural skill. Don’t miss having a closer examination of the stage walls, where there are well-preserved reliefs. Just behind the theater are the rambling ruins of the agora (Roman-era marketplace), which originally would have been surrounded by colonnades filled with shops. Beside the agora are the remnants of the circular Temple of Tyche (dedicated to the Roman goddess of fortune).

The Side Rafting Tour offers you a wonderful day reaching the climax of adrenaline and excitement and discovering the Koprulu Canyon. You will be excited to the full on the water while accompanied by an experienced guid during the most difficult sections of the 15 km long trail. Spend a great day on your vacation with the rafting tour done in the Koprulu Canyon National Park. The Side Rafting Tour is an adrenaline-filled tour done in the Koprulu Canyon National Park. It begins with our shuttle picking you up from your hotel in the morning. You will reach the starting point from the Side region after approximately 45 minutes.

Lonely Travel is a well known licensed travel agency in Alanya & Side. We organize travel services since 1997. We let our customers to save their time and money also providing them a high quality service. In our Travel Agency employees highly trained specialists that are licensed by the Ministry of Tourism of Turkey. We work 7 days a week to provide the best service to our guests. We organize more than 50 tours around Alanya and Side, each and every single excursion of ours is fully insured and maintained by our professional tour guides. See more info on Side boat trip.

The legendary Cleopatra Beach is one of the most beautiful beaches in Turkey, clearly worth visiting during your trip to Antalya. With its crystal-clear water and numerous water sport activities, it attracts about 2 million tourists a year and gets more and more popular every year. The Alanya Archeology Museum is located in the very center of Alanya, on Ismet Hilmi Balcı Street behind Alanya Castle and Damlataş Cave. Alanya is a city with a very rich historical heritage in every aspect. However, you don’t have a lot of chances to visit a cultural places in Alanya. Although the best cultural museum in the region is the Antalya Museum, followed by the Side Archaeology Museum, the Alanya Archaeology Museum is the best witness of the area’s heritage. It’s located in the heart of the city. The Archaeology Museum in Alanya exhibits bronze, marble, terra-cotta, and glass artifacts, mosaics and coin collections belonging to the Archaic and Classical periods, and also Turkish Islamic works of art from the Seljuk and Ottoman Periods.

On your visit to the Dim River make time for the largest cave system in the Alanya area, carved out by water over millions of years but only discovered in 1999. The Dim Cave is 360 metres long, and worthwhile for its many concretions. Something to remember is that there are lots of steps and narrow walkways, so the Dim Cave isn’t accessible to all. As with the Damlataş Cave there’s high humidity at 75%, although the cave does offer respite from the summer heat, with a temperature never rising above 19°C. One of the things to love about this park is its location, right by the cable car station, tourist office, Damlataş Cave and archaeological museum, at the east end of Kleopatra Beach. Within a few steps north along Güzelyalı Cd. there are dozens of places to eat. As for the park, it’s somewhere to escape the heat for a few minutes, under a palm tree or one of the enormous ficuses. There’s a mini-golf course, a fishpond, flowerbeds and pieces of public art like a ceremonious statue of Cleopatra. This is also somewhere to witness Alanya’s affinity for its stray cats, which roam the lawns freely and have special wooden shelters and feeding stations.

This sleek resort is squeezed against the Gulf of Antalya by the dark slopes of the Taurus Mountains. The scenery is defined by a 250-metre-high promontory, sticking out into the Mediterranean and fortified since time immemorial. In Alanya, your days will be spent lazing on an enticing beach and adventuring through those lofty castle ruins, which can be reached by a cable car that opened in 2017. This is one of a few projects that have helped turn Alanya into a 21st century beach resort. The city is also a jumping off point for scuba diving, cruises and trips into the Taurus Mountains where you can hike in canyons, explore caves and bathe in cool mountain streams.

Pergamon in the third century BC was one of the most prosperous cities of the ancient world. Known today as Bergama. Located 100 km. north of Izmir. Attalid Dynasty assigned the city as a capital for their kingdom named as Pergamon Kingdom. Pergamon has also a biblical importance. Mentioned in the book of revelation in the new testament among the seven churches of asia minor. The city was known as the city where the throne of satan is located. Once it was the Lydian Kingdoms capital. A very rich city where Lydians invented the coins in a river called pactolus. Today a 3rd century AD imperial gymnasium and the largest ancient synagogue stands in the site. The gymansium is reerected today. The mosaics in the synagogue are amazing. Sardes is mentioned in the Book of Revelation among the 7 churches of Asia Minor.

You can plan a full day trip to see the ancient city of Side with the temples of Athena and Apollo, and the magnificent theater of Aspendos. The theater is one of the most distinguished representatives of Roman Age theaters today, with its well-preserved condition and architectural features. If you choose to make this trip with an organized tour, it will be either combined with the famous Manavgat bazaar where you can find many things such as souveneirs, clothes, spices, fresh fruits, and vegetables, or the marvelous Manavgat Waterfall. The itinerary depends on which excursion you book. Some have Side, Aspendos, and the waterfall, some have Side, Aspendos, and the bazaar. The weekly market days of the Manavgat Bazaar also make a difference.

Located right next to the Celsus Library, the square is the city’s most important trade and cultural center, Agora, which is the marketplace. Agora has a total of 3 doors, and was built in BC. It was founded in the 3rd century during the reign of Emperor Augustus. Agora was damaged due to a big earthquake in the 4th AC. century and became unusable. In the 6th century AC, a new agora was established in the northern part using the remains here. The section where the newly established agora is located today serves as the Gendarmerie barracks center and entrance to that area is prohibited. Find extra info on https://www.sideexcursion.com/.

Harbor-side, both the Red Tower (Kızılkule) and Seljuk Shipyard (Tersane) are extensions of Alanya castle fortifications, built in the 13th century. The octagonal, 30-meter-high Red Tower served as the harbor’s defense tower in the Seljuk era. Inside, there are exhibits on the Red Tower’s and Alanya’s history, but you’re really here to climb up to the roof for great views across the harbor front. From the tower, a pretty walkway runs along the harbor’s original fortification walls to Turkey’s only remaining example of a Seljuk-era shipyard. The arched halls here, built into the shorefront, are open to the sea, so that waves constantly pummel the stone. The walkway continues from here for a short length along the coastline to a small Seljuk-era watchtower building.

Dim Cave: Just a short hop from Alanya (heading 11 kilometers inland), Dim Cave is hollowed out of the western slope of Mount Cebel-i Reis in the Taurus Mountains. This cavern is Turkey’s second biggest cave open to visitors, with a walkway running for 360 meters into the cave, heading downwards into the depths for 17 meters below the surface entrance. The limestone interior is littered with giant stalactite and stalagmite formations, all the way down to the lagoon at the cave’s lowest level. Bring a jacket or pullover with you, as you’ll need it once you’re within the cave; it’s chilly in here even in the height of summer. The cave entrance area, with its café, has brilliant views of the coastal plateau below.