Gazipaşa Airport → Konyaaltı Transfer

Gazipaşa Airport to Konyaaltı transfer

Konyaaltı is Antalya's western beach district, the place where the coast road stops being a holiday road and becomes a city street, with the Beydağları rising straight out of the bay at its far end. Hardly anyone flies into Gazipaşa with this address in mind. Those who do are usually staying for weeks rather than days — a rented flat, family in the city, a long autumn by the sea — and a seasonal charter into GZP was simply the ticket that made sense. The reward is a district that lives all year; the price is 185 km of coast first.

The start is deceptive: the first half hour of cliff road is the quickest part of the day, and everything after it takes longer than it looks. Then comes the whole eastern coast — the climb away from the sea, the cliff bends through Mahmutlar and Kestel, the length of Alanya, the long open run past Manavgat and Serik. Around 2 hours 30 minutes covers the 185 km in ordinary traffic. The sting is in the tail: you pass Antalya's own airport and keep going, crossing the city from its eastern edge to its western bay, and between five and seven in the evening those last kilometres are the slowest of the whole day.

• It is your landing time at Gazipaşa, not the distance, that decides whether you cross Antalya in the evening rush — a late-afternoon arrival can add half an hour at the very end.
• Konyaaltı runs for kilometres along the bay, and an address at the western end under the mountains adds another ten minutes to an already long drive, so give the building name.
• You will drive past Antalya Airport roughly twenty minutes before you arrive, which is worth remembering when you book the flight home.
• Over two hours in the car is enough to want a break, and the usual place to stop is around Manavgat, about two thirds of the way.