I always try to keep an eye on most of the major online photo-sharing services, just to see if anything interesting comes up about Antalya. Flickr usually has a decent selection of photos of our fair city, but today there were a few pictures that really caught my eye, and it turns out they’re all by one James E Petts. He’s got a fantastic collection of 25 photos of Antalya and the surrounding region (including the ruins at Aspendos and Perge), and they were just posted today, so they’re probably pretty fresh shots.
I like these photos a lot more than most of the tourist photos I see of the region, and here’s why: nine times out of ten visitors see Antalya as a scorching, sunny beach resort and nothing else, and this bias is reflected in their snapshots, which are usually taken in July or August. But what people fail to realise is that for three-quarters of the year (September through May), Antalya is completely different— the weather is mild and even cold sometimes, and often the whole city gets this wonderful foggy-mountainy thing going on (as James so expertly captured in the above photo).
That’s what I really love about this place, that the relatively short summer peaks aggressively and then tapers off quickly, and after that we’re graced with a much more mysterious and interesting display from Mother Nature. It seems like James got to see some of that, and it really shows in his photos. There are 25 pictures in the collection, and not one of them features kids building sand castles or half-naked people playing volleyball on the beach. Not that there’s anything wrong with those activities, but it’s nice to see a different perspective for a change, one that is more in tune with what I feel is the real Antalya, and definitely more reflective of my experiences here. Sure, we get more than our share of sun, but that’s no reason to stereotype us. Antalya, believe it or not, is more than just a resort for beach bums. Many thanks to James for sharing his fantastic photo work. Link
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