The New ATM Dalaman Airport - Flies You To The World! (Dalaman Airport, Turkey (DLM))

Member Name: BabyGirl08x

Product:	Dalaman Airport, Turkey (DLM)
Date:	08/05/08 (690 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: New building, modern, convienent, easy.

Disadvantages: Expensive, long travel to holiday resorts.

If your wondering about the strange review name, thats their slogan/motto. Weird!

Turkey has four main airports that are mostly used for tourism purposes. Antalaya airport, Bodrum Airport, Izmir Airport and Dalaman Airport. The most popular of these Airports, is Dalaman. This is because Dalaman is the closest airport to Turkeys biggest and most popular resort, Marmaris. Dalaman was previously a Military Airport. It would not be surprised to see solders marching around! In 2006 Dalaman built a new airport. The new airport is now more modern, bigger, and more organised. When coming out of the new airport, you can still see the old airport, passing by.

- Where

Dalaman is situated in the Mugla Province, in the south western coast of Turkey. Dalaman itself, is a very quiet place. It is basicly a farming town, situated 5.5km away from the coast. This place inhabits the old-fashioned people of Turkey, the more religious and cultural people. The is no, or very little, tourism here. The only place youll find tourists is cramped in shuttle buses going to one of the near-by resorts. Well, not really near by, most resorts are on average 90 minutes away. This town is situated on the edge of the land, surrounded by the beautiful Medditarian sea.

About the airport

The new ATM Dalaman Airport is roughly only 2 years old. The airports new and modern design has created a more enjoyable and relaxing departure for Turkey's tourists. The aim of this Airport was not only to create an enjoyable experience for passengers, but also to welcome flights from a wider variety of departure airports. The airport now has more flights opererating to and from the airport, and has improved tourism for holiday resorts such as Marmaris, Dalyan, Fethiye, Göcek, Gökova, Kalkan, Kas and Köycegiz.


Facilities.

In the old airport, facilities were limited. This was because the airport was pretty old and not very modern. Here are a few facilities ATM Dalaman Airport now offer

Ticket Sales Counters
Banks
Exchange Bureuos
Post Offices
Emergency Clinics
Baby care rooms
Children's play areas
Car Hire
Hotel Reservation
Florists
Luggage deposit
Small Mosk
Chapel
Sinegog

About 5 of these were available in the old airport.

Airlines & Destinations

The new ATM Dalaman Airport now flies to more places over the world and works with more airlines than ever. Here are some airlines you can go through to get flights to Dalaman in Alphabetical order:

Aeroflot-Don
To/From: Moscow

Aerosvit Airlines
To/From: Kiev

Astraeus
To/From: Manchester, Uk

Atlas Jet (domestic)
To/From: Istanbul

BMI
To/From: Birmingham, Uk. Glasgow, Uk. Manchester, Uk.

Condor Airlines
To/From: Berlin. Dusseldorf. Frankfurt. Hamburg. Hanover. Munich. Stuttgart

Kibris (Cyprus Turkish Airlines)
To/From: Birmingham, Uk. Ercan. Gatwick, Uk. Stansted, Uk. Manchester, UK.

Easyjet
To/From: Gatwick, Uk.

First Choice
To/From: Belfast, UK. Birmingham, UK. Bristol, UK. East Midlands,UK. Exeter,UK. Glasgow, UK. Gatwick, UK. Stansted, UK. Manchester, UK.

Freebird
To/From: Aberdeen,UK. Glasgow, UK. Gatwick, UK. Manchester, UK.

Inter Airlines (Domestic)
To/From: Istanbul.

LatCharter
To/From: Riga.

LTU
To/From: Dusseldorf

Martinair
To/From: Amsterdam

Monarch
To/From: Birmingham, UK. Glasgow, UK. Gatwick, UK. Manchester, UK.

Onur Air
To/From: Amsterdam. Belfast, UK. Birmingham, UK. Cardiff, UK. Durham Tees Valley, UK. Exeter, UK. Glasgow, UK. Istanbul. Leeds, UK. Gatwick, UK. Manchester, UK. Newcastle, UK.
Pegasus Airlines
To/From: Amsterdam. Berlin. Prestwick, UK.

Rossiya
To/From: Pulkovo

SunExpress
To/From: Antalya. Berlin. Cologne. Leipzig.

Thomas Cook
To/From: Belfast, UK. Birmingham, UK. Doncaster, UK. East Midlands, UK. Leeds,UK. Gatwick, UK. Stansted, UK. Manchester, UK. Newcastle, UK.

Thomsonfly
To/From: Birmingham, UK. Bournemouth, UK. Cardiff, UK. Sheffield, UK. East Midlands, UK. Glasgow, UK. Gatwick, UK. Luton, UK. Manchester, UK. Newcastle, UK.

TUI
To/From: Dusseldorf. Hamburg. Munich. Stuttgart.

Turkish airlines (domestic)
To/From: Ankara. Istanbul.

XL Airways
To/From: Bristol, UK. Gatwick, UK. Manchester, UK. Newcastle, UK.

These are the airlines you should contact if you wish to fly to or from any of the cities/towns above.

- Personal expeirence/opinons

I always used to hate Dalaman as a young girl. Not only was it because I have bad memories of leaving the place, I just hated everything about it. I hated the way it was layed out, the people in Duty Free, the check in desks, the shabbiness. I even felt unsafe departing from the airport. Arriving, feeling tired and sweaty, Id come off a long four hours flight. The thing I always remembered about the airport, was the little garden. As you disembarked the aircraft and came out of the gate, you would find yourself walking past some sort of garden. Not a garden full of swings and roses and waterfalls. It was like a glass walkway looking down on a square area of cobbles and trees. It was really random, still it was nice to look at. Passport control was always very strange, I remember two controls, both with very unhappy men stamping passports. They would snatch your 10 pounds, stamp your passport and shout "next". That basicly meant, right, bugger off now. It wasn't a very pleasant start to the holiday. We would then scrabble and somehow find our way to baggage claim. Everything was so disorganised, you couldnt find anything. After baggage claim, you would walk about into a sea of people holding boards with peoples names, people shouting "Taxi, cheappp taxii" and you would have to squash your way past millions of trolleys and lost passengers to find a rep and find out which bus you were on. The bus area was awful crowded too, I always wondered how those buses got out of there! Id be glad once I was out of that terrible place and on a bus. Although, I didn't really know that you were actually driving up mountains and round cliff edges with no barriers! Very scary!

Coming back, I hated the airport even more. First of all ,you were an hours' wait outside the airport just to get in. There were security checks before you entered. The check-ins were awfully unorganised. They used shabby boards above the check in desks instead of electric screens, sometimes making it hard to read from a distance. Also there was one check-in screen in the whole terminal. You had to search everywhere for it. This was allowed, though, as the airports didn't operate as many flights before. Duty free was a pain the back-end! People shouted at you to come in to your shop, that, in Marmaris, would be exceptable. But, could you imagine that happening in Heathrow? There were 3 places to eat in the terminal. All very expensive, and terrible! There was a stall in the departure lounge, you could eat from there if you wished. Although, it was more expensive than the food court. The chairs in departure lounge were metal, and horrible! If your flight was delayed, well, you were sleeping on metal! After departure lounge was the best part, flying! Mytravel airlines, well recommended. Although, they are no longer running, so I don't really recommend.

I was really surprised one summer when we got an afternoon flight. All flights were usually night time. I got off the plane feeling very refreshed! A good way start the holiday. However, I got a very pleasant surprise! I came off the aeroplane to huge space, glass walls and a shiney new floor. This wasn't Dalaman, was it? They must have took me to a different place. I walked up to one of the four open security desks. They photocopied my passport page (probably a new system), politely took my £10 and and wished me a plesent holiday. This definetly couldn't have been Dalaman. I came out of passport control and down the excalators. The first escalators Id ever seen in Turkey! There were more baggage convoyers, and the bags were straight out! I was shocked as I saw "New Duty Free On Arrival" I took a quick look and got some duty-free. Definitely handy! I Walked outside to less people crowding up, and no shouting, and our rep in her own little area waiting for us. "Welcome to Dalaman" She said, I felt better knowing where I truly was.

As I approached the airport returning, I noticed it was exactly the same. Just as shabby as ever. I was pretty confused though, as we passed straight by it, and came closer to a huge enlightened shiny building. So that's what they done, they created a new airport. It looked amazing and large from the outside. We came up though a long ramp, it was really high up. There was shorter ques outside the airport. Another thing not to worry about. Security was fast, easy, and we had no problems. There was a new electric terminal. Boards above check in were large and electric, and they had fitted in more Departure screens. There was three altogether, full of flights going to different places. Wow!

Straight after check in was security control. That was a bit longer than usual, only because there were more passengers. There wasn't just one duty free hall. There was a whole terminal of duty free shops. There was also a separate food court. The food was disgusting, and very expensive. There wasn't one small departure lounge cramped with metal chairs. There was hundreds of glass compartments. Each compartment was a gate, each gate had its own departure lounge, and, own security control. So there was no need to wait in long ques! The chairs were spongy and soft, there was even a coffee stall inside the departure lounge. The whole airport was modern and more useful. Thumbs up for Dalaman.

- Conclusion

The old airport was a terrible mess. Everything was disorganised and shabby. Until, they built their new airport. To be pretty honest I think the airport is great! Thats only because of what I was used to beforehand. However, Id stil prefer Dalaman to our airport In Glasgow. Its much easier and more convenient. Just, slightly more expensive.

Summary: They definetly needed that change!