If you can’t afford the French Riviera, why not try the Turkish Turquoise Coast? If you imagine all the sun, beaches, and ancient sites of Greece, but in Turkish.
For many years, a Turkish holiday was cheaper but these days I am told it is cheaper in Greece.
There are many charter flights to the major airports in this area. Many northern Europeans seek vitamin D vacations for their health.
I went to Antalya. What a lovely city. As I mentioned, I am done with tourism, but then again, I have to do something between eating… and sleeping…
If it is possible, then Antalya has it all. Even beaches. But in the town, it has a great “exotic” holiday where one sits and sips aperol spritzes by the pool after a morning of wandering the bazaar and shopping for oriental rugs..
Antalya has ruins too. It is old. More than 2,000 years old. The city was founded by a king Attalus of Pergamon in 130 BCE. Antalya was the largest port city in the area back then and it still is. It seems like everyone has been here, even St. Paul on his way to Antioch. And since then, Greeks, Seluks, Ottomans, and so many others. It seems that once upon a time not so recently, there were many Russian speaking tourists because there are many signs in Russian.
There are so many instagrammable pedestrian streets and so many places to “be on holiday” that one could spend an entire week just in the old town. They even have public toilets (1 Euro/40 Turkish Lira), although in the heat of the summer, I assume one sweats most water out of the body.
The downside is that in the summer, it is very very hot. Like 110 F/43 C. It is hard to describe how hot that is, but it is too hot to think clearly. Some of us find out that we have sweat glands in the puffy bits under our eyes… even in the shade.
Antalya is a place I would visit again.