Patara

Patara was the harbour city where delegates from the Lycian cities met to vote, and the building they met in has been raised again from its own stone: a stepped assembly hall with rows of seats around a floor, roofed and unexpectedly intact. Beyond it runs a colonnaded main street with a water channel down the middle, ending at the triple arch of Mettius Modestus, and there is a large theatre half filled with blown sand, a granary built under Hadrian, and a lighthouse from Nero's reign re-erected block by block beside a harbour that is now marsh. The site ends where the dunes begin and a long sand beach takes over.

What you actually see

• The assembly building - the reconstructed hall of the Lycian League.
• The colonnaded street - paving, columns and the central water channel.
• The triple arch - the monumental gate at the city's edge.
• The lighthouse - the Roman tower rebuilt from its original blocks.

When to go

Spring and autumn; in July and August the sand reflects heat and the ruins offer no shade before evening. Early morning is best for the street and the arch, late afternoon for the dunes. Turtles nest on the beach in summer, so it closes at dusk, and the marsh brings mosquitoes at both ends of the day.

Honest expectations

A good deal of what you see has been reconstructed, and it looks it - the assembly hall is more restoration than ruin. Sand covers large areas, walking is heavy going, and there is no shade or cafe inside the site. The access road is long, and parking fills fast on summer weekends.

Nearby

Kalkan and Kas along the coast, with Xanthos and Letoon a short drive inland.