There's a road that cuts inland, heading north from Finike to Elmalı, and if you take this road, not only will it give you the chance to visit two little known archeological sites at Limyra and Arykanda, as well as Elmalı, a town highly rated for its old Ottoman houses, but you could if you wanted just keep driving straight on and so creep up on Antalya from the rear.
Finike itself is not much to write home about. A small town best known for its orange harvest, it boasts a pleasing but private marina and a handful of old houses, most of them tucked away in the market streets out of sight of the main road that whips through on its way to Kale/Demre. Still, it's from the road outside the Finike bus station that you pick up a minibus heading north to Turunçova and there that you switch to a second minibus to get to nearby Limyra.
You can't miss Limyra as a lengthy stretch of the ancient city wall stands right beside the road, together with a ticket booth that may or may not be staffed. A gate in the wall leads through to an unexpected expanse of water meadow where, to the rear, you'll spot a cenotaph (empty tomb) standing on a stone plinth which was placed there in memory of Gaius Caesar, grandson of the Roman Emperor Augustus and his presumed heir, who died here in A.D. 4 (by which time the site at Limyra was already more than 400 years old). Far more visually appealing is a ruined temple, also on a plinth, which stands right beside the footpath. If you skirt round the base of this, it's rather like stepping through the back of the wardrobe into Narnia -- except that in this case you step into what looks like a Constable painting of the English countryside around Flatford Mill, complete with a stream, copious deciduous trees and low stone bridges.
What makes Limyra unusual is that it was built beside a river at the point where a spring emerged from Tocak Dağı (Mt. Tocak) and bubbled up right beside the municipal buildings. Today you can make out what looks like the floor plan of a basilican church just beneath the water, while the columns of the temple had to be erected on the plinth to keep them dry. Seemingly, people used to come here to find out what the future held for them by throwing meat to the fish. According to Pliny, if they ate the meat, this suggested a rosy future, while if they turned their backs on it, things were looking grim.
There's not a lot else to see here, although many huge chunks of marble masonry are scattered on the ground, and the spot is so idyllic that you might want to linger for a picnic. But just a short walk away you can explore another of Turkey's many all-but-forgotten Roman theaters, this time standing right by the road, which leaves it vulnerable to graffiti artistes and pesky wannabe guides. A little further along the road, if you look up to the left, you will see a fine Lycian sarcophagus standing amid pomegranate, fig and tangerine trees. More rock-cut Lycian tombs lurk in the back garden of a house almost hidden in vegetation across the road from another stretch of city wall, and then you will come to the shrine of a Bektaşi saint, Katı Baba, which overlooks a small pond and what looks like either another rock-cut tomb or perhaps a niche where a cult object might once have been placed.
The road north from Finike continues past the Turunçova turnoff, and you'll need to keep an eye out on the right for the sign to Arykanda which is just one kilometer off the highway by a sharp bend in the road where a cluster of tea stalls are lined up beside a spring at Arif. Arykanda is an enormous site, which straddles the hillside -- you'll need several hours to do it justice. Although nothing that survives here predates the fifth century B.C., it's probable that the Lycians had originally founded a city here in around 1500 B.C. Most of what remains actually dates from after A.D. 43, when Arykanda became part of the Roman Empire.
If you walk up from the road, you will arrive at the site beside the Naltepesi (Horseshoe Hill), a hillock on which stand the remains of a fourth-century bathhouse. This is just a taster for the dense cluster of municipal buildings that stand straight ahead and which include, most conspicuously, a bathhouse on an altogether grander scale, a basilica with a mosaic floor and a necropolis with an extraordinary assortment of different types and shapes of tombs.
It would be easy to make the mistake of thinking that was all Arykanda had to offer as its other attractions are virtually invisible from below. But if you follow the signs up the hillside, you will emerge on a leveled-off platform with a single tree in the center of it, which is thought to have been the ancient agora. "Agora" is normally translated as "marketplace," but here the archeologists have found no trace of shops, suggesting that instead the arena served as something more like an outdoor council chamber. Tucked away behind it is a small odeon, and then, further up on the hillside another of those extraordinary Roman theaters with a spectacular view that stands virtually intact and yet virtually forgotten. Still further up and you will emerge in a stadium, built like the agora on a leveled-off platform so that it has seats for spectators only along the far side instead of all around it as would be more normal.
Arykanda is stunning and deserves to be a great deal better known. At first sight, Elmalı, in contrast, looks rather uninspiring although it has a lively Monday pazar that spills out from the market hall to occupy most of the main streets. To find the older part of town you'll need to ask for directions to the graceful old mosque ("eski cami"), the Ömerpaşa Kebenci Cami, which dates back to 1610. Ömer Paşa was an Ottoman commander from Manavgat who fought at the siege of Vienna and used the spoils from the capture of Sarajevo to pay for this mosque. Like the ruins at Arykanda, it was built on a hillside, which means that at the entrance end you can actually step from the pavement onto the roof of the original library building and gaze down on the pleasingly tree-shaded courtyard from amid a cluster of neat little domes.
It's in the streets around the mosque that you will find the old houses for which Elmalı is best known. As usual, many of them are in a scary state of decrepitude, although a few in the vicinity of the mosque have recently been restored. Most date back to the early part of the 20th century. Look out amid the more predictable wood and stone houses for the odd one that manages an Art Deco twist.
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