A Visit to the Baths of Cleopatra—Or Not
May 10, 2011 at 11:22 am Tina Hay Leave a comment
On our first full day aboard the large wooden Turkish yachts called gulets (pronounced “ghoul-etts”), we anchored in a cove with a set of ruins in the water. It’s called the Baths of Cleopatra, which is in keeping with the legend that Marc Antony once gave the entire Turquoise Coast to his lover, Cleopatra, as a gift.
Tour member Elaine Keller ’68, ’69g took this shot of me in the baths.
It was only after I waded through the baths, enjoyed the thought of being in the same water Cleopatra once bathed in, took lots of photos, and returned to our gulet that I was informed that this cove actually has nothing to do with Cleopatra.
It turns out that the Baths-of-Cleopatra thing is just a myth that the locals started many centuries ago, and it’s a name that has stuck.
The reality is that the semi-sunken ruins are the ruins of a monastery that dates to the 12th century A.D. Cleopatra’s time was 1,300 years earlier.
Whatever the case, the cove is beautiful.
Tina Hay, editor
Entry filed under: Alumni Association, Penn State alumni. Tags: Baths of Cleopatra, gulets, Legendary Turkey, Marc Antony, Turquoise Coast.
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