Although it has been exactly one year since we moved to İzmir, we still haven’t finished exploring its surroundings.. Since we have been living with a focus on the sea and the beach since we arrived, we missed the historical points for a while.. Of course, temperatures reaching 50°C in the summer and the endless torrential rains in the winter had a great impact on our decision.. We have declared the month of May, when the rains decrease and the weather starts to warm up but not yet scorching, as the “Ancient City Tour” month.. After devouring Denizli, we turned our route to Selçuk on 19 May.. When we say “Places to visit around Izmir”, we have rolled up our sleeves for Ephesus Ancient City and Sirince, the last thing I saw 17 years ago and I remember almost nothing about. Ephesus, Şirince You can find information you will need about the places we visited in and around in this article.
Ephesus Ancient City and Şirince – Transportation
How to get there ? – To go to Ephesus Ancient City and Şirince Village, you have to come to Selçuk center in any case.. Those who do not have a vehicle can reach the district by taking the Selçuk minibuses departing from İzmir bus station and reach the point where they want to go by minibuses.. It takes about 1 hour to go to Selçuk by taking the Aydın highway from the center of İzmir.. Since we provide all transportation by car, I will explain the details in this context.
The Ancient City of Ephesus is 10 minutes away from Selçuk district center.. There are two separate entrances to the ruins; one is above and the other is below, but we cannot see this separation on the signs on the road.. I called it “up and down” myself. The above entry; The entrance, which is located on the Virgin Mary road, has no shade in the parking lot, is far from the most popular ruins of the ancient city, the Celsus Library and the Amphitheater, which is chosen as the starting point of most tours.. We entered by chance through the lower door.. I recommend using this side for the entrance, as it has the opposite of the features of the upper door.. On the lower road, there is also the Temple of Artemis; the place that used to be considered one of the 7 wonders of the world. (I did not enter here because I knew that there was almost nothing left and I thought that I would get angry when I saw this.) If you want to enter Ephesus through the door I described, you can follow the Temple of Artemis.
Follow the entrance road on the upper side of Ephesus Ancient City towards the hill for 15-20 minutes and you reach House of Virgin Mary. If you wonder and desire to see; Seven Sleepers Cave is located on the way back to Selçuk.
For Şirince Village, you need to return to Selçuk district center again.. From here, you can reach the entrance of the village in half an hour by following the up-to-date signs.. We had made it a habit not to move without navigation while we were driving, but navigation left us in a difficult situation on the way back to Şirince.. There’s a lot of road construction work and newly closed streets around.. We understood by getting lost in the side streets of Selçuk that we should trust the signs pointing to the narrow streets.. The junction between Şirince and Nesin Mathematics Village, which is known as conjoined twins, is right at the entrance of Şirince.
