Chimeira-Chimarea Tourism
The Chimarea take its name from the myth of Bellerophon. The Lycian King, Lobates, sent Bellerophon to kill the fire-breathing monster, part lion, goat and serpent. With the aid of the winged horse Pegasus, he succeeded, and returned, after completing other tasks set by Lobates, to Xanthus where he married the king's daughter and became heir of the Lycian throne. Carried away by his success, Bellerophon tried to ride Pegasus up to Mount Olympus; for his presumption, he earned a great thunderbolt from Zeus.
Today, the site is known as Yanartas (burning stone in Turkish), because of the blue flames sparkling out from the rocks at the bottom of Tahtali mountain at around 250 meters above the sea level. Chemical analysis show that it's the methane gas coming out off the earth. Some historic writers mentioned about these flames since from the 4th century BC, and that sailors in the past used the flames as a lighthouse while they sailed along this coast at night time. One has to trek a little bit to get up to these flaming rocks, the view is very interesting especially at night time. The ruins near the flames are mostly from the Byzantine period, but there are also some remainings from earlier periods such as of a pagan temple dedicated to Hephaestus.
