Escape the Crowds
Olympos, Çıralı and the eternal flames
Ruins in a jungle valley, a long protected beach, and hillside vents that have burned for thousands of years.
Why do it?
An hour and a half down the coast, the ruins of ancient Olympos lie tangled in greenery along a river valley that opens onto the sea, sharing a long, wild beach with the village of Çıralı — protected as a loggerhead-turtle nesting shore, so it has stayed blissfully unbuilt. On the hillside above burns the Chimaera: natural gas seeping from the rock and flaming day and night, as it has since antiquity, when it was a sea mark and a legend. Nowhere else near Antalya packs this much strangeness into one valley.
The Smileys Take
Do it overnight if you possibly can — a pansiyon in Çıralı or one of Olympos's famous rustic camps — because the Chimaera is an after-dark experience: a steady uphill walk by flashlight, then flames flickering out of bare rock under the stars. Days go to the beach and the overgrown ruins. This is the coast at its least commercial and the single trip our members will talk about most; spring and autumn are the sweet spots.
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Do it with people
The Smileys community does things like this every week — organized events, spontaneous hangouts, and visitors looking for company.
Tips from Smileys
More like this
There's always more Antalya.