3 Day Fethiye Itinerary: Turkey's Turquoise Coast Guide

Fethiye, Turkey very quickly made it to the top of my favorite places list. It’s situated in the Turkish Riviera, otherwise known as the Turquoise Coast. This guide to visiting Fethiye will help you plan out what a short three day trip may look like for you. It’s an unbelievably beautiful place, with incredible sights, history, food, beaches and hotels, and this example itinerary gives you a taste of it all. The locals here are some of the warmest, kindest I’ve ever come across and it was a true joy to be welcomed into their restaurants and shops. One visit to Fethiye and any traveler will booking their second trip to come back!

Fethiye or Bodrum?

You may be having to choose between visiting Fethiye or visiting Bodrum if you have only a limited amount of days to spend on the coast of Turkey. Bodrum is larger than Fethiye and typically sees more of a tourist swell in the summer months. Because of this, it tends to have a much louder and larger nightlife, while Fethiye is quieter.

Fethiye also has more to do within an hour or so drive, making it a really good place to have as your home base. You can visit the ruins of Letoön and Xanthos from here, Saklıkent National Park and gorge, Lycian rock tombs, and Butterfly Valley. While you can do these things from Bodrum, reaching them will require a greater time commitment and further drive. If you do go to Bodrum, make sure to stop by Mud Art Ceramics for beautiful, handmade ceramics to bring home!

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fethiye turkey 3 day itinerary and guide

Looking for more on Turkiye? Check out our other posts!

5 Best Restaurants in Fethiye
5 Best Day Trips from Fethiye
Visiting Ephesus: Guide to Touring the Ancient City
5 Day Istanbul Guide: Best Things to Do
3 Day Guide to Cappadocia
14 Day Itinerary for Visiting Turkey

How to get to Fethiye:

There’s quite a few ways to access Fethiye, and Turkey has a great national transportation system. You can arrive by plane, car, bus or train. The cheapest options are going to be by public transport (bus or train), but I’d recommend getting there via plane or rental car. This Fethiye itinerary includes places in the surrounding and greater Fethiye area, so having your own vehicle is ideal for getting the most use out of your time and getting to do things at your own pace.

The closest airport to Fethiye is Dalaman Airport, which is 30 miles from downtown Fethiye, and a taxi into Fethiye from the airport will cost $35 USD on average. You can also rent a car right at the airport. Of course you can fly into other airports and drive in, like we did (you can view our 2 week Turkey Itinerary), which I also think is a great way to get there because you get to see more of the country!

Izmir airport is 3 hours and 45 minutes north of Fethiye by car, passing Ephesus on the way and making it a great place to pick up a rental car to make these ancient ruins a stop on your trip. To the west, Antalya airport is 2 hours and 45 minutes from Fethiye by car.You can even make Fethiye a part of your trip if you’re traveling to Greece! There’s a Rhodes-Fethiye ferry that shuttles travelers between the Greek isle and this beautiful Turkish paradise for about $50 USD. The journey takes about 90 minutes.

Driving in Fethiye, Turkey

Now that I’ve recommended utilizing a rental car in Fethiye, let’s talk about driving in Fethiye. In the downtown area, there is ample street parking along the boardwalk, although during high tourist times in the summer months, it’s likely to be busy. Hotels will all mostly have parking lots, so the day you do explore downtown, you may opt to just walk or take a taxi the way there and take your time walking back to your hotel.

The driving once you get out of the more congested main drag is fairly straightforward and not much different than driving anywhere else. There’s a lot to see and do within 2 hours of Fethiye, which is why we made this our “home base” for a few days and took our day trips in the car from here.

The places in this itinerary aren’t easily accessible by public transport. As you go further from the downtown area, the driving does become more mountainous, so if you find mountain roads with steep inclines or declines stressful, better to let a partner drive and you can enjoy the incredible scenery and fresh mountain air like I did! We always opted to take the scenic route along the coast, even if it added 20 or so extra minutes to our drive times – we both highly recommend it!

During the times we visited (June 2021, April 2023) gas prices were about $3 USD per gallon. If you can get a rental car that runs on diesel, that’s the one you should get. Diesel is less expensive and more common here. For reference, we had a diesel SUV and spent $80 on gas for 7 days and drove it from Izmir to Antalya, making many stops and day trips along the way.

Best Time to Visit Fethiye

Fethiye has a mediterranean climate which means it has hot and dry summers with mild, sometimes rainy winters. While it can be visited year round, there are some factors to keep in mind! It can get really hot here in the height of summer, and is a popular summer destination for Turkish families and sun seekers, and it’s also a very popular tourism destination for Europeans.

With that in mind, the months of July and August are not only very hot, but it can be crowded and more expensive. Therefore, the ideal times when considering cost of travel, climate and amount of tourists are early summer, May and June, or late August through September and October.

Fethiye Hotel Recommendations

There are so many incredible hotels in Fethiye and the surrounding areas. The two I’d personally recommend are Hotel Unique and Yacht Classic Hotel. Hotel Unique is adults only, and Yacht Classic Hotel is family friendly. We had excellent experiences at both and would stay at either again in a heartbeat. Both have restaurants on-site, great breakfasts, amazing views, pools and helpful staff. The both offer rooms with balconies and rooms that have hot tubs on the balcony as well.

Itinerary Inspiration

There are so many things to do and see within driving distance from Fethiye that it would be impossible to fit everything worth doing into 3 days. Below the sample itinerary there are additional ideas and activities for how to spend your time in Fethiye, along with a few guided tours we recommend. This way you can add in anything you’re more interested in, or change things around if you have more than 3 days to spend here.

Day 1:

Once you’ve settled into your hotel, get aquatinted with Fethiye by heading up to check out the Amyntas Rock Tombs, which are situated at the top of the main area of Fethiye and date back to 350 BC. You can park and then walk up to the top to see them up close.

From there, head down towards the main boardwalk area to walk around, explore and see the views from right next to the water. Grab lunch or coffee at one of the seaside restaurants. My recommendation is to eat at Denizati Restaurant and Bar. Great Turkish food and seafood on the menu, and the views across the harbor when you sit outside are beautiful! On either ends of the boardwalk there are two large parks, the one closest to the marina has mini golf and a splash pad area and great for kids if you are traveling as a family.

The afternoon can either be spent at the beach or heading to the Fethiye Old Town Market. Küçük Beach is almost directly across the bay from the Fethiye marina and main area. It’s located on the peninsula, and I recommend driving the road around all the way around it, even if you aren’t planning to hit the beach. It’s a quick but beautiful drive with many places to pull off for photos. There is also another beach on the far side that is nice as well.

The market is a great place to see a Turkish bizarre in action with lots of hustle and bustle from locals, shop owners and tourists alike. There are many places to sit and grab a beer to people watch, and plenty of shops and stalls to stop into for gifts to take home with you.

Another option for visiting the market is to go first thing in the morning, right as they are opening for the day. If you want to have a less crowded experience and see the market mostly unobstructed, this would be a great option for you to be able to wander through the alleys without heavy foot traffic.

Day 2:

Get an early start today and head out of town towards Ölüdeniz and the Babadag Cable Car. Babadag (meaning “Father Mountain” in English) is a mountain about 6500 feet above sea level, and is a very popular place for paragliders to take off from. However, for the rest of us, there’s an easier way to get to the top for incredible 360 degree views and back down to the ground.

It’s a really wonderful family friendly activity as well, and it’s free for children under 7 years old, and $11 USD round trip for everyone else. If you are visiting in the summer months, I recommend doing the cable car right away to beat the crowds and enjoy the views at the top before it gets too hot, and then spending time afterwards in the city and beach area.

There are 4 stops to take you to the top of the mountain and you can get off at each of them and admire the views if you’d like and simply hop back on the cable car to go to the next stop when you’re ready. There are different food options at each stop, and you’ll get to watch the paragliders take off from a few of them. The hours depend on the season, so be sure to check the website, at high season they start running the cable cars at 7am. Try to go on a clear day for incredible photos!

Afterwards, you can spend time in the town of Ölüdeniz, which is different than the beachside area, or opt for the beach. This is probably one of the most beautiful lagoon areas in the world, and as such it does get crowded. If you drive past the main beach area and towards the inlet, there are a few less crowded spots around Paradise Beach.

In the afternoon you can take a scenic drive out to Butterfly Valley to stop for photos and continue driving along this road to take in the dramatic sights. There are quite a few pull off opportunities to stop for photos, and many cafes past Butterfly Valley to grab Turkish food on a patio overlooking the Mediterranean. Kelebek Restaurant is a great one for incredible views and cheap yet delicious Turkish food or a coffee.

You can end the evening back around the Fethiye marina area and grab evening dinner or drinks along the boardwalk or in the main Fethiye city. For a casual dinner next to the water and marina, I recommend Tamarind Restaurant and Bar, or for a bite to eat further into the city and awesome Turkish food head to Pasa Kebab.

Day 3: Saklıkent National Park and Tlos

Start the day early again, heading out to Saklıkent National Park to visit the canyon and Gizlikent waterfall. This park is definitely worth a visit, even if you don’t do the full walk through to the waterfall. Even before entering the canyon, there are suspended bridges to enjoy walking across the river on. Depending on the season, the rushing water will be ice blue or sometimes a bright blue green. The Saklıkent gorge is 9 Turkish Lira per person to enter, which is about $0.30 USD, and you can pay right at the gate.

Inside the gorge there is a place to get coffee or Turkish tea, there are tables and benches you can sit and enjoy the experience of being inside a canyon. It’s one of the deepest in the world (almost 1000 feet deep!), so it’s a cool thing to cross off a bucket list. A bit up from the parking lot is a restaurant along the river with tables quite literally along the river. They have pretty decent food, each table area has hammocks you can swing out over the river in, and it’s a good family friendly place with quite a few animals like ducks and geese swimming around in the river and fountains.

After your visit to the park, you can hop into the car and drive out to see Tlos, an ancient city dating back to 300-500 BC. It’s only a few miles drive from the gorge, so it’s easy to do both in one day. It’s location alone is stunning and a really awe-inspring drive.

Tlos was one of the first and largest ancient cities in the Lycian period, and there is evidence that Tlos may date back even further into the Bronze Age. You can walk throughout the area and explore how people lived and thrived here, with entire communities, shops, aqueducts, theaters and more.

Depending on how much time you have, I do also recommend seeing Xanthos and Letoon, though I am not including them in this itinerary because I’m not sure you could reasonably fit them into just three days. If you do have more time available, these two are well worth a visit as well.

Optional Ideas for Your Itinerary:

There is no way to fit everything into a 3 day Fethiye itinerary, so check our our post on the 5 best day trips from Fethiye and also the list of additional ideas below for other ideas to switch into your time here in Fethiye or add to it if you have more than three days!

Additional Activities:

Gizlikent Şelalesi Waterfall
Sultans Aqua City Waterpark (for families)
Lycian Way Trail (for hikers)
Xanthos and Letoon Ancient Cities
Marmaris Castle
Dalyan Rock Tombs
Fethiye Museum

Additional Beaches:

Ölüdeniz Beach and the Blue Lagoon
Kabak Beach
Katranci Bay
Akbuk Cove
Turtle Beach

Additional Cities in the Area to Explore:

Göcek
Marmaris
Kalkan
Kaş
Dalyan

Additional Restaurant Recommendations (Fethiye & Surrounding Area):

Nihan’s Kitchen
Olive Garden Kabak
YakaPark
Address Restaurant
Mori
The Mulberry Tree
Oasis Ölüdeniz

Guided Tour Ideas: