Kemer → Side Transfer

Kemer to Side private transfer

The move east is usually the second half of a two-centre holiday, and it is made for different reasons than the move west. Families who found the shingle hard going with small children book the rest of the fortnight on flat sand. Everything on the eastern excursion list also comes within reach: the theatre at Aspendos, the Manavgat river, rafting on the Köprüçay in the Köprülü canyon — an hour or less from a Side hotel, a full day of driving from the Kemer coast. Others travel for a wedding at one of the eastern hotels, or to join relatives who booked that end of the bay.

Here the demanding driving is done first. Leaving Kemer the D400 climbs away from the shore at once, curves through the short tunnels high above the water, passes Göynük and Beldibi and then drops to the plain behind Konyaaltı — 45 km, and the last mountain road of the journey. Antalya comes next, crossed on the ring road, where a late-morning departure runs into city traffic. Past the airport junction the land flattens for good: 65 km of straight dual carriageway by Aksu, Serik and the Belek turning to the Side exits. Around 1 hour 35 minutes for the 110 km.

• An old town address is not where the drive ends: the peninsula lanes are closed to cars, so the transfer stops at the entrance by the theatre and the car park and you walk the last part.
• Setting off in the middle of the day puts you on the Antalya ring road when it is busiest; an hour earlier or later shortens the drive more than the distance suggests.
• Say whether you are heading for Kumköy, Side itself, Sorgun, Titreyengöl or Çolaklı — coming from the west some of them lie before the Side junctions and some well beyond them.
• The driver waits at the agreed pickup point with a name sign, which at a Kemer hotel means reception rather than the gate at the end of the drive.