Sleeper train Istanbul to Antalya?
 

I'm having difficulty trying to figure out if there is one, or if there isn't what station would bring us closest to Antalya or preferably the Kas area. After Istanbul I'd like to go to the south because we would be working our way up the coast by rental car to Cesme.

I figure a sleeper train would be the most comfortable & cheapest, and we wouldn't really be losing any time because it would be overnight.

The Man in Seat Sixty-One has extensive information on Turkish railroads: http://www.seat61.com

You can take the train from Istanbul to Denizli and then bus to Fethiye and then bus to Kas. The train is comfortable. Also a train runs to Konya from Istanbul.

Turkish sleepers are comfortable and cheap, and the trains usually have dining cars. The buffet at Istanbul Haydarpasa station serves good meals, with wine. Konya is well worth a day for itself, to see the tomb of the saint who founded the whirling dervishes, and a small museum of Greek sculpture. You can book yourself to arrive in the morning and leave on a sleeper for Adana or Istanbul that evening, and base yourself for breakfast and so on at the hotel very near the tomb. You can lunch in the sultan’s garden a bus ride up the hill. Also, Konya gives you a view of a particularly Moslem city, more orthodox than many in Turkey.

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I wonder where I would take a train to where it would be relatively easy to pick-up a rental car? Is Denizli the closest I can get to Kas via train? Also, is it better that I secure my train tickets and my ferry tickets (to Italy) through an agent before I arrive?

Will you be going to Ankara? My husband and I took the overnight sleeper train from Istanbul to Ankara a few years ago. (our daughter was teaching at the American Air Base in Ankara). The train was wonderful, comfortable, clean sheets, great breakfast, ....and a real treat to look out the window in the morning and have a beautiful view of the plains of Turkey). You could rent a car in Ankara and continue on with your trip down to the coast and "around".!

I am unsure if we will be going to Ankara, it depends on if we will have 11 or 14 nights. Thanks for the responses!

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