I generally consider myself more of a traveller than a holidaymaker. So booking a beach trip is unusual for me, but Side in Turkey served up a great escape with an added side of history. Here are five reasons Side is worth considering for some summer sun.
1. It’s pretty good value for money
I invariably add some beach days to the end of a long-haul trip, but with my April visit to Japan and Seoul, I wanted to maximise the time on cultural adventures. So when we got home, feeling a bit more tired than rested, my friend and I decided a European summer beach break with guaranteed sunshine was needed.
Having looked at various options, Turkey came out quite a bit cheaper than other destinations including Greece and Spain. We could have booked a Jet2 or Tui package from Stansted, but we prefer Gatwick and easyJet flights to Antalya plus the Kalia Beach Hotel in Side (pronounced Sea day), on Booking.com came out at a similar price – around £550 each for six nights. I tend to use Booking.com for most hotel and some apartment bookings now. The more you use it the bigger the discounts seem to be and you get added extras like breakfast. You can also earn credits along the way, so I used £40 towards the booking at the Kalia, which was a lovely small hotel and exactly how it looked in the photos on the website.
Once in Side we found prices varied quite a bit. There were some really nice higher-end places to eat with good quality creative food as well as cheaper family-run restaurants with traditional and international menu options which were also great. A lot of the visitors to Side are from European countries so everything is priced in Euros as well as Turkish Lira. We generally paid in Lira either in cash or on a card. Sometimes we were quoted a price in Euros (e.g., for a taxi or a shop with no price labels) and then when we asked for it in Lira the rate quoted was more than we’d paid elsewhere. When we queried it they changed their tune, so it pays to check the latest exchange rates.
2. There’s a lovely long sandy beachfront
Our hotel was around 10 minutes walk from the start of Side Old Town which sits on a promontory jutting out into the Mediterranean Sea. I’m not sure how far you could walk in the other direction and still have beach access, but we had it right out front of our hotel and the sandy beach stretched as far as we could see in both directions with some parts quite narrow and others wider.
Sunbeds are available for hire everywhere, run by the various bars and hotels opposite the beach. Our beds were included in our hotel rate and run by the staff at the hotel restaurant, Gua. And they were probably the most comfortable sunbeds on Side beach, made of wood and with thick mattresses and large umbrellas. The downside is that the staff won’t allow them to be moved to get into the shade (apparently they get broken). So if you’re fair-skinned like me you might need to get creative with clips and towels, but both are cheap to buy in nearby shops.
The sea is surprisingly shallow for quite a long way out so perfect for kids and people who prefer to keep their feet on the ground. And while there were a few small waves, as with most of the Med there was no tide, so you were never more than a few steps away from a refreshing dip.
3. It has a pretty old town with a fascinating history
Side’s old town has it all. Pretty side streets with cascading pink bougainvillaea, a harbour with tall ships and yachts and plenty of cafes, bars and restaurants. There are also shops galore selling jewellery, clothing (lots of fake designer wear) and local Turkish tea and sweet treats.
But the most interesting part for us is that Side is pretty much a living archaeological site. Roman ruins are everywhere with some under glass panels that you walk over; some that are in pretty bad shape; and others that have been restored or restoration is in progress.
The most impressive is Side’s 20,000-seat amphitheatre. It’s in great shape and was the only site we paid to go into. It was pretty punchy at €17, especially as that included entry to the Side Museum which is currently closed! But we were fine to pay for it as we saw all of the other sites for free. That included the agora (meeting place), an ancient street lined with the remains of shops and houses, a monumental arch and the Temples of Apollo and Athena. One of these has been partly restored. I think it’s Apollo but there seems to be some variance in what people think online! But more work is underway so I suspect there will be another set of columns next to it soon.
Some people explored the ruins in the evening but the old town was pretty busy in the evening with lots of people staying in hotels further out of Side coming in to visit by taxi or minibus. So we decided to go in the morning before it got too hot and found it much quieter.
4. There’s a multitude of places to eat and drink
Obviously good food and drink is key to any good holiday and Side is not short of options. One of the nicest aspects of where we stayed was the promenade that runs the length of the beach to the old town and around the promontory. Perfect for an evening stroll and lined with restaurants and bars, that are great for sunset views.
In the old town area we ate at Moonlight which has a lovely position overlooking the ocean and serves amazing fish. I had a delicious fish stew that was packed with sea bass. That was at the more expensive end, while Apollonik is an excellent value family-run restaurant right by the Temples of Apollo and Athena. It has a lovely courtyard as well as tables overlooking the harbour. Further round in the main square facing the harbour we liked Aphrodite. They were so friendly and accommodating, they made us excellent omelettes after our sightseeing of the ruins even though it wasn’t on the lunch menu. Around the corner, there is quirky Kiss Bar which does good cocktails with free snacks – juicy cherries and tasty nuts. And close to that is Karma, a restaurant and bar overlooking the Med that becomes a nightclub later in the evening.
Closer to the hotel, we really liked Favori. Like Apollonik it’s a traditional place that is very good value. It also has an excellent big screen, making it the perfect spot to watch England beat the Netherlands to reach the final of the Euros. We also loved Lime for lunches and evening cocktails, the staff couldn’t have been more welcoming and friendly. And of course, we ate at our hotel restaurant Gua, a cool spot that gives more of a Bali than Turkey vibe. Breakfast was served to the table rather than a buffet and they offer waiter service on the beach during the day with a menu of decent wine, cocktails and light meals. We also had dinner there on our last night in Side which was fab, with delicious burrata and fish dishes. Once the dinner service is over Gua is another venue that turns into a club. Our room was towards the back of the hotel so the music didn’t bother us too much, but if you’re closer you might not get much sleep before 2am!
5. It’s in a good location betwixt and between
Side is about an hour’s drive from Antalya airport and is probably about halfway between the centre of Antalya and Alanya. Both are much bigger places and attract a lot of UK tourists. So we chose Side because we preferred somewhere smaller, where we could stay in a hotel on the beach but be walkable to the old town, and where there would be fewer British accents. We find it’s much easier to relax on the beach and block out the chatter of other people when they are speaking languages we don’t understand! We’d also stayed in Antalya previously on the way home from Uzbekistan and while we loved our hotel there were a lot of Brits talking about the procedures they’d had at nearby clinics. Antalya is known for plastic surgery and teeth whitening but we saw no (visible) evidence of that in Side!
So if you’re in Side for longer and want to explore it’s easy to do a trip up or down to Antalya or Alanya and it’s also only 40 minutes to the Aspendos archeological site. And of course, there’s a range of boat trips, jeep safaris and paragliding adventures to be had. Or you can just do as I did and make the most of enjoying the sound of the gentle waves and the constant sunshine, before returning home to what’s been one of the worst British summers I can remember in a long time!
For more European adventures and city break ideas check the Europe section of my blog.