Day 6 of Turkey Vacation: Antalya on August 24th, 2016

by admin

The plan of the day was the historic old city of Antalya. Also, since Expo 2016 was going on in Antalya (and the city built a new tramway for it), we decided to pay it a visit.

The first stop of the day was Old Roman Harbor of Antalya. Once an economic lifeline to the city, now the old Roman Harbor mainly served tourism boats, while the actual port of Antalya had been relocated out of city.

Overlooking Old Roman Harbor of Antalya

The images in this post are hosted on Imgur. Email me should there be any display problems.

Antalya Old City

The interesting thing is that, the city of Antalya built an elevator just north of the old Roman Harbor, so pedestrians don’t need to take the long detour down the ramp to access the harbor from the rest of the city. The elevator platform also served as a wonderful sightseeing observatory.
And there were even air-conditioning in the elevator, which was very pleasant in the blistering summer heat.

Overlooking Old Roman Harbor of Antalya

Streets of Antalya Old Town leading to Harbor

Tour Boats at Antalya Old Roman Harbor
Tour boats in Antalya Harbor were generally bigger, more decorated (many of them have pirate themes) and presumably more expensive than Kas.

Stairs down to Old Roman Harbor from Antalya Old City
Nice Greenings.

Antalya Historical Clock Tower

Tower of Yivliminare Mosque

Tower and Prayer Hall of Yivliminare Mosque

Tower of Yivliminare Mosque Standing out among Antalya Old City

Buildings in Antalya Old City Extending to Sea

Tour Boats at Antalya Old Roman Harbor

Antalya Old Roman Harbor

Cliffs of Antalya City and Sea-side Resorts

Mermerli Beach and Cliffs of Antalya Old City

Tour Boats at Antalya Old Roman Harbor

Seaside Restaurant

Wooden Sculptures of Goats in Antalya Old City

Overlooking Mermerli Beach

Konyaalti Beach and Cliffs of Antalya City in the Distance

Public Park in Antalya Old City

Streets of Antalya Old City

Decorated Doorway of A House in Antalya Old City
I really like the paint on the doors, and how it’s contrasted against the color of the walls.

Streets of Antalya Old City

Lovely Ancient House at Antalya Old City

Streets of Antalya Old City Decorated with Umbrellas

Antalya Old Tram Tracks

Palm Trees along Anatalya Ataturk Street

We found a service booth of Antalya Tram card just next to Ismetpasa Station (I mentioned in yesterday’s post that our card cannot be popped up through a normal ATM machine.) So we popped up our Tram card, watched our time (as the tram to expo run on 80 minute interval), and took the tram to the expo park.

Shops near Antalya Tram Ismetpasa Station

Antalya Expo 2016

Antalya Tram Expo Station

There weren’t a lot of people visiting the expo park, definitely different than the Shanghai 2010 expo that I’ve been to. On the other side, the exhibits were not nearly as exciting as the Shanghai ones.

And with tickets at 15TL (the officers even asked how old I was to give me a youth discount, which I hadn’t been aware of), it was very much an affordable expo.

Colorful Shades of Antalya Expo 2016

Cameroon Pavilion

There was those ~~shops~~pavilions of African countries that I never heard of selling souvenirs. I reasonably guessed that whatever they sell were most likely made in China.

Green Wall of Istanbul Pavilion

Decorations at Antalya Expo 2016

Istanbul Pavilion Exterior

Ducks Swimming in Istanbul Pavilion Pool

Istanbul Pavilion Exterior

Istanbul Pavilion Pool

Istanbul Pavilion Exterior

Kazakhstan Pavilion

Kazakhstan Pavilion
Drawings of Kazakhstan Children of Plants

In the Kazakhstan pavilion, we met a Kazakhstan woman that, to our great surprise, spoke wonderful Mandarin. She told us she picked up her Mandarin during her studies in Xinjiang, and she was very proud of her country as the host of the next expo. We even took a group photo that, due to privacy concerns, I will not post here.

Italy Pavilion Exterior

Thailand Pavilion Exterior

Qatar Pavilion Exterior

Welcome Tea of Qatar Pavilion
I’m not a big fan of this Qatar tea. But Qatar Pavilion offered other Qatar food (for free), which if I remembered correctly was from date tree, which was really nice.

Of the many pavilions and gardens we visited in this expo, Qatar is the only one that didn’t try to sell things. Instead they offered welcome food and drinks, which coupled with the wonderful services of Qatar Airways that brought us to Turkey, greatly boosted our favorability ratings of this tiny nation.

Restroom of Antalya Expo 2016
Yes, that was quite colorful.

Korean Pavilion Interior
I’m not sure Korean style of gardening would involve such excessive human-height plants. A more plausible explanation was that the entire pavilion was outsourced to some company that didn’t know Korean gardening at all.

Cat Family Models

Rubbish Bins at Antalya Expo 2016
If you look carefully, you could find (and only find) Chinese and English characters on it. Guess the Expo management just purchased these bins from some Chinese factories off-the-shelf.

Chinese Pavilion

Indian Pavilion Exterior

Plant Decorations at Antalya Expo 2016

Antalya Expo 2016 Children’s Island Dome
The so-called Children’s Island were the most populated area in the entire expo part. It was basically, a tiny theme park for the underaged.

Catering Facilities at Antalya Expo 2016
With more than half of the stores closed, no wonder nobody’s sitting in those chairs eating.

Antalya Expo 2016 Turkcell Tower

We could have board this Turkcell tower for 10 or so TL per person (I forgot the exact numbers). But since we figured that we would see nothing other than miles of primitive farmlands stretching beyond the horizon ~~and a tiny expo park beneath us~~, we killed that thought.

Flowers
Since the Expo was themed around “flowers and children”, there must be some flowers around. I guess it wasn’t an easy job to keep all those flowers blossoming in this blistering heat.

Expo Congress Center

Antalya Expo 2016 Congress Center
This center was definitely built for conferences later on. For now, there was an insect exhibition on the second floor, and that’s it.

Sitting Area
As usual, always colorful.

Insect Model

Spider Model

Columns of Antalya Expo 2016 Congress Center

Palm Trees

Antalya Expo 2016 Indoor Gardens

Antalya Expo 2016 Congress Center and Turkcell Tower

Turkish Airlines Kids Science and Technology Center

Turkish Airlines B77W Model at Kids Science and Technology Center

The Kids Science and Technology Center was in my opinion the most populated venue in this expo park. But I was already beyond the age to marvel at simple science gadgets, we didn’t stay there for long ~~after getting enough of the air-cons~~.

Decorations of Flowers and Palm Trees

Palm Trees and Chanel

Antalya Expo 2016 Central Lake

Sculptures of Fish Bones at Antalya Expo 2016 Central Lake

Decorations of Cactus

Turkcell Tower before Central Lake at Antalya Expo 2016

Exterior of Agriculture and Biodiversity Museum

There were framed leaves and stems and roots in the Agriculture and Biodiversity Museum. Since I knew none of them, I quickly skimmed through them and left.

Decoration of Plants and Camel Procession

Exterior of Agriculture and Biodiversity Museum

Entrance of Chinese Pavilion

Japanese Garden
It’s just an open-access garden decorated in Japanese style.

Turkish Pavilion
Again, an open-access garden. This time, I didn’t say anything of Turkish style.

Azerbaijan Pavilion Entrance
This must be a country proud in its candies.

Netherland Garden
A not-so-well-maintained garden.

Sunflowers on Roof of Ukrainian Pavilion
I don’t think they were real.

United Kingdom Garden
A typical English quadruple garden, poorly managed.

Moldova Garden

Battalgazi Pavilion

Pavilion Decorated with Flowers
This should be the pavilion of some Turkish province, I forgot which one.

South Africa Gardens

Antalya Expo 2016 Central Chanel and Fountains

Nepal Pavilion

Expo Greenhouse

Antalya Expo 2016 Greenhouse

Plants

Flowers

Plants

Antalya Expo 2016 Greenhouse

Chanels and Fountains

Antalya Expo 2016 Central Chanel and Fountains

Antalya Expo 2016 West Entrance

So we spent a little bit less than 3 hours in the expo parks, before heading back to downtown Antalya on a tram ride.

Fields West of Antalya

Antalya Tram at Expo Station

Our Dinner

We finished dinner on a street-side restaurant near Ismetpasa Station. We chose it partly because the store owner successfully ~~seduced~~impressed my parents with his no-so-good Mandarin.

More Antalya Old City

After dinner, we somehow recalled that we didn’t visit Hadrian’s Gate in the morning, which was the must-visit site of the Antalya old city. (Well, we roamed the old city without Google Maps in the morning and enjoyed ourselves getting lost.) With Google Maps, Hadrian’s Gate wasn’t very far from Ismetpasa Station.

Hadrian’s Gate

Cat Guarding Hadrian’s Gate

Hadrian’s Gate

Arch of Hadrian’s Gate

Hadrian’s Gate

We stood at this Hadrian’s Gate for a few minutes, imagining how magnificent a gate it shall be in the past as it served as the threshold of Antalya city on its highway to Side, where we would visit the next day.

Fortress of Hadrian’s Gate

Then we walked the Antalya old city towards the sea, on a street we didn’t explore in the morning.

Flowers and Houses of Antalya Old City

Islamic Pattern on House under Sunset in Antalya Old City

Minaret of Sultan Alaadin Cami under Sunset

Remaining Minaret of Kesik Minare

Ruins of Kesik Minare

Ruins of Kesik Minare under Sunset

Streets of Antalya Old City

House in Antalya Old City Decorated with Flowers

Sunset

Ranges of Mountains west of Antalya

Hıdırlık Tower under Setting Sun
A tower built in the second century.

Sunset over Antalya Mountains

By the time we reached the Western end of Antalya old city (a.k.a. Mediterranean Sea), the time’s right for a magnificent sunset.

Sunset over Antalya Mountains

Streets of Antalya Old City

Cat Resting over Window in Antalya Old City

Decorated Villa in Antalya Old City

Streets of Antalya Old City

Then we followed pretty much the same path as in the morning and walked back to the comfort of our hotel rooms, passing old Roman harbor once again to greet the “pirates” setting sail.