Want to impress your date while MedTrekking around the unpathed, hostile and impenetrable coastline on Turkey’s Datça peninsula?

Not a hot Datça date!

Not the place to hike on a hot date!

Then ignore a potential negative reaction to the challenging rough-and-tumble terrain by taking a romantic 20-kilometer urban/rural stroll through the town of Marmaris and around its easy-to-negotiate gigantic bay.

Kick things off just after sunrise in the cozy suburbette of İçmeler, near the one Mediterranean Sea entrance to a bay visited by Alexander the Great in 334 BC.

The 6:54 a.m. sunrise over Marmaris Bay.

Cruise through casual İçmeler.

Then continue along the seaside and urban promenade and try to ignore the fact that the normal 31,000 population of Marmaris swells to about 250,000, including many Russians, during the summer.

View from Marmaris.

Easy walking (Photo: Liz Chapin)

Once out of town follow the forested coastline and road to the Yacht Marina for a swim before having dinner at the Garden Restaurant. If you’ve been bonding at all during the day-long MedTrek, it’ll be sunset when you’re back in town.

Nearing the Yacht Marina.

After sunset.

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About Joel

Joel Stratte-McClure has been a global trekker since the 1970s. He lived in France for over 30 years, working as a journalist, before he turned his attention to a unique life-time-project of walking the shores of the Mediterranean. The first 4,401 kilometers are explored in his inspirational and entertaining first book "The Idiot and the Odyssey: Walking the Mediterranean." The next 4,401 kilometers are covered in the gods-filled sequel, "The Idiot and the Odyssey II: Myth, Madness and Magic on the Mediterranean,” published on Valentine's Day 2013. The last 4,401 kilometers will be discussed in the last book of the trilogy currently entitled "The Idiot and the Odyssey III: Alexander the Great Walks the Mediterranean."