Antalya Day Out Turkey – A Day Trip Around the Old Town

I took my wife into Antalya town centre for a day out and as we got off the bus we decided to take a walk down the street where the artists stalls are set out. I think it is a great way to encourage and promote local artists who perhaps can’t afford a shop to display their goods.

It was a bit of a surprise to see the abstract artist Salvador Dali displayed so prominently.

I went around the stalls taking some photos so you can get an idea of what else was on offer. Here are some traditional turkish rag dolls

A collection of hand-made bags.

I took a picture from this angle so you can get an idea of exactly where it is located but alas, since I took these photos for some reason the stalls are no longer there. Maybe the shop keepers got jealous.

Here is an interesting piece of artwork featuring heavy use of the symbol which are used to ward off the Evil Eye.

There was a stall with lots of fun woolen hats which as a child I would have been very happy to wear. I would of course have chosen the green one with the tongue sticking out from this batch.

Here is the lady who makes them.

Normally I see them in the Royal Mile at the Edinburgh Festival but I do appreciate a guy who can make a puppet on strings come to life and be entertaining. This guy was pretty good so we stopped for 5 minutes or so to appreciate his talents. I didn’t put anything in his cup though….after all, I am Scottish. 😉

I feel sorry for these horses who have to stand around in sweltering heat all day and then jog around town carrying morons who think it is cool to encourage such a thing. There has been a couple of incidents with the Horses collapsing from exhaustion.

This is only started a few years ago in Antalya and I was not impressed with it then and am even less impressed with it now as the number of carriages have increased over the years.

This Mosque at the entrance to the Old Town certainly gets it’s fair share of tourists and as long as you take your shoes off before you go in, they are happy for you to go in and take a look at the inside.

Unfortunately the Shaman Jewelry shop was shut as I could have done with a magic amulet or 6 to help me get through life.

They still have some public telephones here but ,nstead of the Red Box they have these coverings decorated by landmarks of Antalya.

After some walking around we were getting hungry so we went to Rokka again where my friend Joshua made another tip top Pizza for us. Highly recommended to check it out if you are around the Hadrians Gate area of Antalya.

After being well fed I thought it would be a good idea to round the day of with a couple of swallaes…which is Scottish for Alcoholic Beverages.

There is a bar in the Old Town called Sheffield which I though quite a funny name for a bar in Turkey and what makes it even more funny for me is that I met my first Turkish wife when I went down to Sheffield in England to see the Rolling Stones many moons ago. I will put the full details of that crazy story in my book when I eventually get around to working on it seriously.

Unfortunately I thought this caption to be fairly accurate.

The thing that Sheffield bar is most well known for is that they sell Guinness on draft! That was indeed the main reason why I went there that night as it is my favourite beer. My wife had never tried it before so I had to take a photo of this momentous occasion.

And you can see what it did for her! Greatness!!

We then headed off for a walk around Kaleici to see if we could find some action and ended up in Raven Pub where my friend Rusty James was playing in his new duo, Soul Drive.

I got the camera out to record some of their songs.

I thought this was a pretty cool piece of artwork from inside the bar.

We had a chat with Rusty after their set had finished and took the obligatory selfie….although he was surprised when I didn’t say ‘tongue’s out’ as I used to do when I drank a lot more in the past.