My husband, 3 year old and I are looking for a base for a 5-6 day July visit around Ephesus. We would like to rent an apartment or house and plan to rent a car. We would like to be within an hour of Ephesus. I haven't looked in detail at what else we would like to visit, but it seems like there are lots of sites. It would be nice to be near the water since I imagine it will be hot, and I also imagine a 3 year old will have limited excitement about ruins - but who knows. We don't need to be in a town, but it would be nice to be close to something so we can eat out most evenings. Thanks for any advice!
Betsy

You may want to do a search of lodging in Kusadashi on the Aegean coast 10-15 minutes from Ephesus. We ate lunch there one day and thought it might be a nice place to come back to.

We stayed in Selcuk last fall at the Pensione Nilya and walked downtown each night for supper, but it it may not be workable for a 3 year old.

I would definitely recommend Selcuk. Just returned from a few nights there with DH-- what a cute town full of friendly people, lots of restaurants, very walkable, and a great location too-- 5 minutes from Ephesus and 7km from Pamucak Beach on the Aegean. My understanding is that it gets very hot and quite crowded in July, as it's their high season for tourism, but at least in March it's really wonderful. We had a car and definitely recommend visiting Priene and Miletus for more ruins. It's a beautiful area-- good luck with whatever you choose!

I also agree with the recommendations of Selcuk and or near to say Pamucuk beach...we visited there in feb. 2007

I agree with Selcuk as well. We based ourselves there for three nights last month and were very pleased. The town is cute and definitely very walkable, and there are lots of restaurants. From here we visited Kusadasi (nice but, imo, very touristy), Priene, Miletas and Didim.

Tracy