Carrying Capacity in Terms of the Sustainable Tourism

In the archeological cultural inventory of Antalya Governorate a lot of religious structure remains were identified in Demre and Saint Nicholas Church is the cathedral. Nowadays, the area known as Saint Nicholas Museum is visited especially from May to October during the DMK one day tours. Tourism implementer’s aim of drawing tourists can pass over the carrying capacity of that district or area. The main goal of our study is to draw attention to the problems about carrying capacity which is faced in touristic areas and substantially affects sustainable tourism. In our study it was tried to obtain data to determine the relation between the density of visitors of the (Father Christmas Museum) Saint Nicholas Church in Demre and the carrying capacity of the area. The study includes the guides registered to Antalya Tourist Guides Guild. The questionnaire survey, which was used to collect data, was applied to 163 guides who were chosen by simple random sampling. Data analysis was done by SPSS 13.0, and t test and Anova test were used. Through a training program for guides which focuses on Saint Nicholas and the religious edifice remains from Demre, the narrations and messages of the guides leading tours in the area should harmonize with the cultural tourism policy of the administration and should get the best out of belief tourism.