Introducing Bezirgan...

panorama of Bezirgan

Bezirgan, the yayla or summer village for Kalkan, is 22km from the Mediterranean coast, 700m up in the Toros Mountains.

Its population in the summer months is around 650 souls, dropping during winter to 150, when most of the population move back down to the coast to escape the cold - the temperatures can fall to -16 degrees in the winter, with severe frosts.

It's a farming village, whose people grow wheat, barley, fodder vetch, chickpeas and sesame in fields bordered by almond and walnut trees.

The traditional farmhouses in the village are built of stone, held together with a mud/straw mortar, and roofed with soil. Those which have seen some restoration work in the past have had the soil roofs replaced with tiles, generally using the buildings' original timbers, which for the most part were cedar, garnered from the great cedar forests of the Kateran Dašlar. They are good houses, which deserve to be treated with respect : preserved, restored and protected. traditional farmhouse
shady lane The village itself is also deserving of conservation, so that its environment and culture can be preserved for future generations.

Traditional Buildings People at work.. Birds Useful links Site Map

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