Fancy diversifying your beach holiday with a visit to some interesting tourist places in Turkey to enrich your cultural and historical knowledge? Then the excursion to Demre, Mira and Kekova from Alanya is definitely something you'll enjoy. It's a great way to see the ancient sites that our ancestors lived and died in, and to understand how they built cities, buried their dead and developed their culture. You'll get to experience the past of ancient people who lived long before our time.

In the morning, you'll hop on a comfy coach from your hotel to Demre, where you'll find the ancient city of Mira, where St Nicholas the Wonderworker lived and looked after his flock. The city is important not just for Christianity, but for history in general, too. Today, you can still see a few buildings, a big amphitheatre, and amazing rock tombs.According to the ancient people's legend, the higher a person is buried, the closer they are to paradise. They might have been right, they might not. But these tombs are bound to get your imagination going.

In Demre, you'll visit the Church of St Nicholas, where the miracle worker is buried, and you can buy religious souvenirs in the church shop. Then after lunch, we'll go on a short boat trip to the island of Kekova, where you can see the ruins of the sunken city of Simena under the clear blue water. The ancient city underwater is amazing and you'll get some great photos. After visiting Demre, Mira and Kekova, you'll learn a lot about the history, get to know the ancient people's lives, see the amazing underwater city, and walk away with some great memories.

Ancient Myra

Myra, an ancient city near Demre, was a developed city and the centre of ancient Lycia. It was a busy place – coins were minted here, showing it was a really important economic centre. Different nations repeatedly invaded the city, and earthquakes, which are pretty common in this area, destroyed it several times. But life in this place was reborn each time.

The Great Amphitheatre, the main attraction in Mira, is still standing today and is a really unique structure because it mixes Greek and Roman architecture. The ancient Greeks and Romans put on grand performances there, and its excellent acoustics have been preserved to this day.

As well as the amphitheatre and other buildings, you'll also see unique rock tombs, which the ancient Lycians believed were important. They thought that you should bury your dead ancestors as high as possible, closer to the heavens, and the richer the ancestor, the higher their tomb. Sometimes, depressions in the rock were carved into several tiers, bound together by columns.The view of the cliffs with tombs up to the heavens is absolutely incredible.

St. Nicholas Church

You'll also visit the Church of St. Nicholas in Demre, which was built in the 300s AD after the saint's death. St. Nicholas lived and preached in the city for 43 years, during which time he performed many miracles, after which he became known as the Miracle Worker.According to legends, he secretly gave gifts to children at Christmas, and is now honoured throughout the Catholic world as Santa Claus.

Inside the church, built in the shape of a cross, you can see lots of interesting frescoes, as well as the marble sarcophagus where the saint was buried.The relics of Nicholas were taken to the Italian city of Bari, where they are kept to this day.

Many believers say that visiting this church has a special effect, and there are pilgrims who come specifically to pray and ask for a miracle.When you visit the Church of St Nicholas, you can feel the strong energy of the place.

Kekova

To get to Kekova, you'll need to hop on a small, comfy boat. There's something really exciting about travelling by sea, especially when you're heading to an ancient city that's sunk.

Simena was once a thriving Lycian city with big, beautiful buildings and structures, some of which were several storeys high. But it was constantly hit by devastating earthquakes, which destroyed it time after time, and the city gradually went under water until it was completely deserted.

As you sail towards the city, you'll spot bits of columns, walls of buildings and staircases breaking out of the sea surface, making you feel like you're part of a great history. Your guide will tell the story of the city, and you'll picture yourself in the shoes of the people who lived and enjoyed the sunny days, working in the workshops, trading in the square, falling in love and starting families, and discussing or praising their rulers. But then, overnight, everything collapsed, making the poor and the rich the same.

You'll probably remember this amazing place, in the depths of the blue sea, where you can see the remains of ancient civilisation and get a sense of the mystery of life for the ancient people who lived there. With the city as a backdrop, you'll get absolutely stunning photos.