Cappadocia to Olympos

The overnight bus to Antayla was far easier than the one from Istanbul. We only made a handful of stops along the journey, which allowed a rhythm to form as the bus engulfed the miles. While convenient from a practicality standpoint, overnight buses are brutally difficult. When you arrive at your destination, you are not rested and ready to begin your day. Rather, you just want a warm shower and a bed (doesn’t even need to be comfortable) to sleep in until you have recovered from the torment of the bus.

We arrived in Antayla at 7:15, I purchased my ticket to Olympos, boarded the bus and we departed at 7:35—almost on time (the driver took a 15-minute smoke break about 10 minutes into the trip though). The only instructions I had received back in Istanbul for this portion of my Turkey experience was that I would need to get to Olympos and then switch to a local van that would transport me to my hostel. Someone was watching over me again because this segment could have been really bad…

There were three early to mid twenties Turks (1 girl, 2 guys) and I overheard one of them say the word “Olympos.” At the initial smoke break, I turned around, pointed at the leader and asked, “you going to Olympos?” He nodded and I pointed to myself and responded “Ok, me too.” This simple interaction might have prevented a significant amount of confusion, wasted time, and heartache. At the third stop, a restaurant in the middle of a luscious valley, the leader motioned that they (and subsequently I) were exiting the bus. While astronomically confused—I was expecting a bus terminal, not a ratty restaurant—I followed my friend’s lead, grabbed my bag from the back, and departed the bus. As our transportation drove off around the corner, I knew that without these three Turks, I would have never exited the bus. Fortunately, our local van showed up about fifteen minutes later, we boarded, and were taken down into the valley and towards the beach. Unexpectedly, the four of us were all going to the exact same place. How did I manage to get on a bus with three locals that were going to the EXACT same place as me?