If you are weighing up what trip to spend your money on when holidaying in Marmaris, then look no further than the Happy Tours Turkey Dalyan Boat Trip. A day where adventure and relaxation are perfectly balanced and there’s something for everyone.

Highlights of the Dalyan boat trip include turtle spotting off Turtle beach, luxuriating in mud baths and marvelling at the Lycian rock tombs, in between you’ll enjoy cruising in the sunshine and jumping off the boat for a swim. If you’re lucky you’ll even spot dolphins – we did!

Itinerary of the Happy Tours Turkey Dalyan Boat Trip

This is a full day trip – starting at about 8.15am and finishing at 7pm.

The day begins with being collected from your hotel by minibus and taken to the Marmaris marina. Once all the passengers are onboard, you’ll set sail for Dalyan.  On the way there we stopped for a dip in the sea in a little cove and had lunch onboard.

Lunch consisted of breaded chicken, rice and salad, there was also a vegetarian option and you could buy chips for extra. Drinks are not included in the tour price but there’s a bar and café open for the duration of the tour.

It was a large boat with sunbeds on the top deck and a shaded area downstairs – there was a bar on each level. We opted to sit at the back of the boat where the kids could colour in at a table and we could watch the captain’s dog and his antics.

Turtle Beach stop

Dalyan is totally unlike anywhere else – on one side of turtle beach is seawater, on the other side, fresh water channels with reeds. You have to disembark the big vessel before it runs aground, and continue the journey in smaller boats that can navigate the shallower, marshy water.

While at turtle beach you can sunbathe and swim in the salty or fresh water – or you can stay on the wooden piers to try and spot the awesome Caretta Carreta turtles that live and spawn here. We were elated to see several turtles  – not just by the beach but also as we explored the fresh water channels in our boat. It was really fun looking out to see who could spot them first, the children loved it.

Lycian Rock Tombs

Carved into the cliff face are several rock tombs that were built to house the Lycian family that had them built, as they believed in reincarnation. They were so impressive and it was wonderful to be able to go so close to them by boat.

Mud Baths and Thermals Pools

Then we stopped at the mud baths and thermal pool. When our first children heard that we were going to visit mud baths they kept threatening not to go in. Predictably though, they were the first in and last out, and they did not want to leave. A dip in the thermal pool was exactly what we needed after washing the mud off us in the cold showers.

By this time in the day it’s time to return via little boat to the bigger vessel ready for the homeward journey to Marmaris. It was early evening, the party tunes were on and our children could be seen doing the macarena!

Once we arrived back in Marmaris we were taken via minibus back to our hotels – this was well organised and efficient – pretty impressive considering around 200 passengers got off the boat.

Cost of Happy Tours Turkey Dalyan Boat Trip

ADULT £21

CHILD (7-12) £10

INFANT (0-6) Free 

Prices include hotel transfers, lunch, boat rides on the larger and smaller boats and entrance to Turtle beach and the mud baths. The only thing you might need money for is drinks, ice creams and photographs if you’d like to buy them.

Why book with Happy Tours Turkey?

There’s lots of benefits of booking with Happy Tours  – you can research their tours online, free from obligation and haggling. If you need any further info then they have an online instant messaging service with their helpful staff. Happy Tours also have a YouTube channel so you can get an idea of what’s included before you book. The prices are really good and you can pay online or in cash – we found online payments helpful because it meant we didn’t need to keep withdrawing Turkish lira from the cash point – saving us money on the transaction fee.