In June, we went on our first family holiday to Turkey! The last time Seth and I went away was on a short weekend break to Paris for my 30th Birthday and that was before either of the boys were born so needless to say, this holiday was much needed! We went with our friends, Ben and Emma and their children, Blake and Sienna who are similar ages to Caleb and Levi.
Caleb was so excited about going on a plane, when we woke him up at 4am on the morning we left, he was practically bouncing up and down with excitement! I couldn't get a picture that wasn't blurry but he looked so excited so I'm posting it anyway!
He had the window seat on the plane and was so excited to see it take off and land. The flight was about 4 hours and the boys were brilliant, no problems at all! It helped that Levi slept for some of it and Caleb had things to watch and games to play on the tablet!
Our hotel was lovely, we stayed at the Eftalia Splash Resort in Antalya, about 2 hours from the airport. It is definitely a family hotel, there were quite a lot of children there even though we went during term time (oh the joys of having children who aren't school age!). Our room was great as we and the boys had our own bedroom, which meant that we didn't have to go to bed when they did!
It was such a chilled out holiday. We spent a lot of time out at the hotel pool. Seth found it too hot and was often cowering in the shadows, ha ha! I love the heat so I was fine :). Aside from getting sunburnt! I couldn't believe it, I rarely get burnt but I guess my skin just isn't used to it so for the first few days I had to wear a t-shirt out by the pool until it healed up.
We also went to Eftalia Island, which is 10 minutes walk from the hotel. There are loads of restaurants, swimming pools and water slides there and it was just another fun area to go to. I always thought I was quite a wimp when it came to water slides but I was loving going down them! Emma and I I may have ditched the boys and left them with the kids for a couple of hours so that we could try out all of the slides, it was so much fun! Caleb loved going down the water slides at the hotel and it was so nice to see his confidence grow. He went down one huge one which freaked him out a bit but he really wanted to try it! The worst thing was, I went down first so that I could catch him at the bottom and once I was at the bottom, I realised that it would be way too fast and steep for him, but at that point, there was nothing I could do, as I couldn't tell him to not come down! He did look pretty scared as he was coming down but the boy handled it like a champ and came up grinning! He didn't want to go on that slide again though, ha!
On one of the days, we went on a pirate ship to Alanya. The pirate ship was pretty cool, they were playing Pirates of the Caribbean music as we boarded which was pretty cheesy but fun. There were "pirates" climbing up and down the ropes and swinging around, they are so brave! One of them could have only been around 12 or 13! It was incredible to watch. At one point, the ship stopped so that people could jump off and have a swim in the water. I didn't go in but Seth only went and jumped in from the very top of the pirate ship! MAD! He told me afterwards that when he got up there, he thought about not going through with it but a little crowd had gathered to watch him so he had to do it!
On another of the days, we hired a car and headed further afield to do a bit more exploring and went to Side to see some ancient Roman ruins. It was so beautiful there and the little town is lovely. The area we walked around seemed a bit less touristy than where we were staying and the views were just incredible.
From there we went to Manavgat waterfalls. They were doing a lot of construction near the falls so we couldn't get close enough to really see them. We really wanted to swim in them too! We found a nice area a bit further up stream that fed into the waterfall and went into the water there. Despite it being such a boiling hot day (I think it was around 45c that day...) the water was freezing and if you stood in it for more than a few seconds at a time, you would begin to lose the feeling in your feet! Still it was very refreshing!
Did I mention that we went jetskiing??! We went jetskiing! It was one of the things on my bucket list and I really wanted to do it! I screamed for most of the time, Seth was the one driving and I am convinced that he was trying to throw me off the back but somehow I managed to stay on. It could have been that I had an iron grip on him so that I wouldn't go anywhere, ha! It was such a rush though, I would definitely do it again in a heartbeat! Maybe I would even be brave enough to drive the next time!
All in all, it was a lovely holiday and just so nice to get away and be with family and friends. You would have thought that the holiday would have satisfied my wanderlust but somehow it has made me more greedy and made me want to go away again, ha! I'm really glad we got to go away and spend some quality time together.
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