If You Go: Cirali

Cirali is tucked away in a national park reserve about 90 minutes south of the large resort town of Antalya.  You can get a direct flight from Manchester (and Leeds) to Antalya.  If you are looking for big resorts and fun parties...Cirali is not the place for you! If you are looking for empty beaches, fresh seafood, and a chill, family vibe...that's what you will find in Cirali.  There are no high-rises, so most of the hotels are very casual complexes with low buildings.  Here's what you'll find in Cirali

Hotel

• Aida Hotel: This was a lovely spot - not the boutique hotels we are accustomed to, but very comfortable.  The entire hotel is built in a beautiful garden with lush flowers and trees everywhere you looked. Each morning, they cooked made-to-order eggs and also were available to book excursions (we booked our boat tour and chimera hike through the hotel).  Recommended ($90/night)

Restaurants 

• Lemon Restaurant: This is a lovely restaurant right on the main street of the town with great Turkish food.  They offered many delicious appetizers...and gave us several for free.  P had a casserole dish that was delicious! 
• Aida Restaurant: Our hotel also had a beach-front restaurant.  We ate lunch here every day - everything we tried was delicious including their chicken kebab, hummus, shrimp, etc.  The staff was incredibly friendly and the food was always good! 
• Aubergine Restaurant: This is another restaurant on the main street of town.  Full disclosure: this may or may not have given me a 5 day stomach bug.  That said - the food we tried was delicious!  We had the most incredible mezze platter that had tons of delicious dips and veggies.  I also had the shrimp.  I really hope that this wasn't what caused my issues because the food was SO good!

Sites 

• Boat Trip: We took a full day boat trip that was really amazing.  They stopped about about 6 different small bays in the area to swim and check out the scenery.  Despite the fact no one else on the boat spoke English, we had a great time!   Bring your underwater camera!
• Chimera: This was a serious hike - about an hour up hill to get to these natural flames coming out of the Earth.  Once you were there, it was a really interesting experience.  I think I had built it up in my head to be cooler than what we found 
• Olympos: If you walk down the beach for about a half hour, you'll find the Greek Ruins of Olympos.  These were really neat and definitely worth a walk!