Tour operator day trips to Saklıkent are the default for most tourists from Antalya-region resorts, and the logic is sound: the distance makes self-organisation difficult, and a packaged day with hotel pickup, transport, guided gorge entry, trout lunch, and return simplifies the whole thing. The limitation is flexibility. The tour runs on its schedule — early hotel pickup, multiple stops, and a fixed return time that may or may not align with how long you want to spend in the gorge.
A private transfer gives you the journey without the fixed itinerary. Depart from your hotel at the time you choose, arrive at the gorge entrance without intermediate stops, stay for 3 hours or longer, and return when you decide. If conditions at the gorge are better than expected and you want to wade further in, your driver waits. If the gorge is closed on the day, your driver is there to adapt.
For guests from Kemer — at 175 km the closest region — the 3-hour journey each way makes the day long regardless of format. The difference is whether the gorge time itself is flexible or fixed. For guests from Alanya making a 310 km round trip, private transfer is essentially the only format where the entire day is in your hands.