Bodrum area Holidays

Bodrum splits its attention between age-old sites and modern additions. At one end of the scale, there’s the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus – one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World – the Castle of St Peter, and an immaculately kept Roman open-air theatre. Ships, sea life and sunken artefacts are on display at the Museum of Underwater Archaeology. The party-seeking crowd, meanwhile, have lively nightlife to look forward to. They can add a floating beach club, steamy mud baths and the famous Bar Street to their to-do list.

Sandy beaches don’t come in small portions here – the Bodrum region’s got them stocked in bulk. Gundogan, on the north side of the peninsula, takes on a traditional Turkish image. It’s ring-fenced by bumpy hillsides and villas, with a roomy beach tacked on to the bottom. Things are even snoozier in Akyarlar, which is perched at the tip of the Bodrum peninsula. Pale sands are bookended by tree-freckled slopes, and the water’s like looking through a pane of glass.

If Bodrum was Batman, then Gumbet would play the part of Robin. They’re right beside one another, with a pointy headland splitting them down the middle. And while Gumbet knows a thing or two about history, its main skill set has a more up-tempo theme. The beach goes hell-for-leather when it comes to watersports, and in July and August, the shallows are buzzing with jet-skis and banana boats. In the evening, bar-hopping crowds are treated to live music until the early hours.