Antalya is the engine room of the Turkish Riviera, the stretch of Mediterranean coast that more or less invented the modern family mega-resort. The beaches at Lara and Konyaaltı are long, gently shelving, and backed by some of the most ambitious all-inclusive properties anywhere, places where the line between hotel and theme park has quietly dissolved. That scale is the point for families: water parks with serious slides, lagoon pools, kids' clubs running supervised days, and evening shows, all folded into one price so parents can stop reaching for a wallet and a five-year-old can ricochet between pool and playground minded by nobody but the staff. Land of Legends takes the same idea and builds a whole theme park around it.

What saves Antalya from being only a resort is everything stacked just behind the beach. The Roman theater at Aspendos is so intact it still hosts concerts, the ruins at Perge sprawl enough for kids to roam, and the old town of Kaleiçi tangles harbor lanes around Ottoman houses. The mountains rise fast from the sea, so a morning on the sand can become an afternoon riding the cable car up Mount Tahtalı or wading the cold gorge water at Saklıkent, with the Düden and Manavgat waterfalls thrown in for good measure. The Antalya Aquarium covers the rainy hour. The hotels are overwhelmingly large all-inclusive resorts with family suites and full entertainment programs, which makes this one of the easiest, best-value warm-water weeks in the Mediterranean for a family that wants the planning done for them.