Our Greek Getaway

GREECE!!! Yes, that’s where we were on vacation. Although it may be a little overrated, we had a great 10 days in this wonderful country. Our plans to visit Greece actually started last year. Being in a Jewish country, holidays were not hard to find. There is always something coming up. So we started planning in April 2011, but it worked out only now: Sep 2012.

The planning was given to me entirely, so I chose Athens, Crete, Santorini & Mykonos. Our first stop was of course, Athens. We took the early morning flight out of Tel Aviv via Larnaca, Cyprus. At Larnaca, we had almost 6 hours to spare. So we got out of the airport, jumped into a bus and headed out to explore the city. So our first stop was technically Larnaca. We had an amazing Cypriot breakfast at the beach, swam in the Mediterranean & relaxed for a while.

We reached Athens by early evening. It took us about 45 mins to reach our hotel which was very close to Syntagma square. The best place to stay in Athens would be in and around Syntagma square or the Plaka area. Here the metro connections are excellent and there are also buses from/to the airport. After checking into our hotel, we walked along Ermou Street & noticed that almost all the shops were closed. So we then stopped at McD for dinner. It was our first day and McD seemed to be the most convenient option. The best part about going to Greece is that most people speak English. So you wouldn't have any trouble getting around or ordering food!! J

Going through all the booklets/maps that we collected from our hotel, we decided to take the Athens walking tour the next day. The only way to make calls on a public phone booth in Greece was through a calling card. So we bought one from a kiosk and managed to call the office just in time.  The office was open till 11 pm, and they had place for us in the group. They charged us 36€ per person. We even got a small discount, as one of the information booklets we had, had discount coupons in the back for the tour. We met the guide at the metro station early in the morning. They took us from Syntagma metro station through the National Garden, Zappenion, Temple of Zeus, Hadrian's Arch and finished off at the Acropolis. We stopped to see the changing of guards’ ceremony that takes place at the Parliament at every hour. The tour did not include the entrance fee for the Acropolis & Temple of Zeus (12€ combined). We were lucky that day, the last weekend of September was the European Days of Cultural Heritage, and so the entrance was free. Before reaching the Acropolis, we stopped for Greek yogurt at this amazing place where I had my first taste of Greek yogurt with berries.

The approach to the Acropolis was a small climb, with paved pathways. The guide was always telling us to be careful with our belongings, as its common for pickpockets to roam the tourist spots. Once at the entrance to the Acropolis, there were people all around. So that’s when we had to be extra careful. As we entered the Acropolis site, the crowd spread out. The most famous Parthenon was the biggest attraction in the Acropolis. Our guide gave us the history of the place and then left us to look around on our own. We had a spectacular view of the city from the Acropolis. It is from this spot, we had the entire view of Parthenon too.

One of the sour spots of the Parthenon were the huge metal scaffoldings and other equipment all around used for archaeological purpose. We felt that it ruined the look of the structure. Apparently it has been going on for many years now. Nevertheless it is a spectacular structure. Once out of the Acropolis, we walked through the Plaka area. This is the main tourist shopping area of Athens. From souvenirs of all sizes to leather sandals you can find all this and more. There were also innumerable places to eat. It was in one of these places that we had our first meal in Athens. It was called Souvlaki, which is grilled chicken/pork on a skewer. It is usually eaten with a pita & salad with the traditional Tzatziki. This cost us about 8-9€ per person. If we had got this souvlaki in a pita like a sandwich it should not have cost us more than 3€.

The worst day to be in Athens is on a Sunday. Most of the shops & museums are closed. Except for souvenir shops & restaurants, we did not have much to see that day. So by evening, we headed out to the most romantic spot in Athens, Lycabettus Hill!! It is a small hill overlooking Athens. There was a winch at the end of Ploutarhou street (7 €) which took us all the way to the top. We also had the less expensive route of walking. But we preferred the winch. There was a church on one side of the hill in front of which we sat and enjoyed the lights of Athens. There was a great restaurant there with a wonderful view of the Acropolis.  We found a good spot, and had a fantastic dinner of Greek Salad & Pasta.

The next day, we had time to explore the outside of Athens. We found a tourist information office near the Acropolis museum and found that there were buses available to most of the tourist places like Delphi & Sounio. We decided on Sounio, as the travel time was less, and we needn’t be too rushed to get back to the hotel, since we had to catch a flight to Heraklion that night.  We even found innumerable private tours, but we decided to do this on our own. Most of the tours cost about 40 to 50 € per person.

There were frequent orange buses from Athens to Sounio, taking two different routes (via the Coast & via Lavrio). All the buses start from the bus station at Alexandras Avenue. We were told to take a metro to Victoria station and walk across to the bus station. Instead we took the bus from Filellinon Street which was very close to our hotel. We were very happy that we took the coastal route because the view was just breathtaking. It costs us about 13€ one way per person plus 4 € for entrance to the Temple. The entire journey of about 1.5 hours was really amazing. We travelled all along the coast about 60 km south to the Temple of Poseidon (God of the Sea) at Cape Sounio.

The Temple was at the edge of the cliff overlooking the Aegean Sea. The Temple by itself was in the Parthenon style, with excavations still happening in the premises. We had to get our feet in the beautiful blue waters of the Aegean Sea. So we trekked down to the shore and enjoyed the cool blue water. There was also a small café at the site, where we had lunch, as we waited for the bus to arrive. We spent about 2-3 hrs at the site. The bus stops at the Temple, so there are no hassles as the timings are clearly marked in the bus stop.

We took the 2pm bus back to Athens. In Athens, we visited the first Olympic stadium, Zappenion & then walked through Plaka. We walked back through Ermou Street (from Syntagma Square) all the way to the Monastriaki station. Although they may not have much of souvenir shops, they housed H&M, Zara and the like. There was also the lovely Mitropoli church which is not to be missed. On our way to our hotel, we found a wonderful Indian restaurant- Indian Kitchen, where we had a yummy Indian meal of Roti & Biryani.

We bid goodbye to Athens & headed out to our first island, Crete. We took a 10pm flight to Heraklion from Athens. We checked into Hotel Olympic on Kornarou Square. This was very close to the August 24^th Street, which is the main shopping street of Heraklion. This leads all the way to the Heraklion port. The next day, we visited the famous tourist attraction of Heraklion, the Palace of Knossos. We took a bus from our hotel to the Palace. We bought the ticket for 1.5€ from a kiosk & took line 2 to the Palace.

At the Palace, we were charged about 4 € for entrance, and we were given a small pamphlet about the history of the Palace. We were interested in knowing more about the palace, so we were on the lookout for a guide. At the entrance of the site, there were authorized guides available for a group of 6-8 at 10 € per person. I think that’s the best thing we did, as our guide was just excellent. She gave us a very interesting picture of the Minoan civilization. And the entire tour of the Palace made so much more sense to us. The tour lasted about 2 hours. Our guide was really helpful as she even gave us an idea of what else to see in Heraklion.

On completing the tour, we had fresh orange juice at the café and headed out to explore the rest of Heraklion. There were many souvenir shops outside, which we had to visit. We picked up some souvenirs and took the bus back to the city. We were dropped off at the bus station, which was right across the port. We enquired about the bus timings to go to the nearby beaches and headed out to the Castel del Mollo. This castle was at the old harbor of Heraklion. Nothing much to see as there was no entry inside. So we sat at the harbor for a while and had lunch at corner of 24^thAugust Street. We picked one of the first taverns that we saw. But the food turned out quite bad and the service was pathetic.

We then walked along the Venetian walls of the city, and went back to the bus station to take us to one of the beaches to the East of Heraklion. We had a number of beaches to pick from and we decided on the closest beach on the East, Karteros. We spent a relaxed evening there, swimming in the cool water. In most of these beaches, there is a charge of 5 € for a pair of sun beds and an umbrella. It was a warm day and we were in need of that umbrella!!

We returned to Heraklion city, by the evening, and walked through the shopping street. Since it was the evening, most of the shops were closing except for the cafes. We relaxed for a while in our hotel and then headed out to have our dinner. This was the first day we had an inexpensive meal which was really worth it. As we were walking towards the Morosini fountain, we found this souvlaki sandwich shop with a huge line outside. So we decided to try out what everyone was trying. It turned out to be really good. This meal cost us 7 €. We sat in front of the fountain and enjoyed it thoroughly!!

We had an early start the next day for our trip to Spinalonga Island. Unfortunately our tour started at Ammoudara village, which was about 15 minutes west of Heraklion city. We spent about 15 € (for taxi) and caught our tour bus. It was then that we experienced our first rain in Greece. This really worried me, but thankfully it stopped by the time we reached Agios Nikolas, our first stop.

It was a beautiful quaint town with an amazing view of the Aegean Sea. We had almost 2 hours to spend at this town.  We walked through the Flea market and all the way up to get the wonderful view of the lake. Surrounding the lake were many cafes & souvenir shops. Agios Nikolas was a great place to start our tour. We found boats taking tourists to Spinalonga from Agios Nikolas. But it takes lesser time from Elounda, where we took our boat to the island.

We went past Spinalonga Island and came to this breathtaking island, Kolokythia. This was our pit stop for lunch and we were just amazed at the place. It was a small beach only visited by tourists. It had the clearest of blue waters that we had ever seen. As we docked in the island, we could see small fish come around the boat. On the beach, we needn’t go too deep to see fish at our feet. It was the most amazing feeling. It was a pity, that I couldn’t swim, but I thoroughly enjoyed the beauty of this small island. After the swim, we had a sumptuous meal with salad in our boat & we were off to our next stop, Spinlaonga.

Spinalonga is a large fortress on this small island. We did not get much information about this place as our guide was quite bad. So we just walked around and understood everything from the pictures. It was formerly a leper colony and has become famous by the book ‘The Island’ by Victoria Hislop. We spent about 2 hours walking through the entire fortress. This island has a beautiful view of the Aegean Sea. The island was mostly in ruins. We were back on our boat by 5 pm and we took off to catch our bus from Elounda back to Heraklion. This was our second night at Heraklion, and by now we had a good idea as to where we wanted to eat. So we headed back to Morosini fountain, where there was this small gyros shop. This was the first time I tried Gyros in Greece, and I loved it!! It was more or less like shawarma. So we had a good dinner and headed back to our hotel for a good night’s sleep.

The next day, we headed to the Heraklion port to take the ferry to Santorini. This journey was most exciting to me, as I had heard a lot about the beauty of Santorini. We had a simple breakfast and left to the port by 8.30 am. We took the high speed ferry and reached Santorini by noon. The approach to the port was not as I expected. I did not see much of the white & blue landscape from the port. I wondered if we were actually in Santorini. As we were waiting for our guide, we noticed that, there were a number of rental companies, renting cars for as low as 25 €.

The drive from the port up to the town of Fira was spectacular. The port was at the bottom of the cliff, and the entire island was at the top. So as we drove up to the town, we could see the entire Aegean Sea behind us, also the view of the Caldera. And then we could see the white landscape of Santorini slowly revealing itself. We checked into a nice cozy room at the Asthir Thira hotel about 2 mins from Fira town. The teak wood beds and the ambience of the room were excellent. The hotel is not on the cliff edge but the top rooms had a view of the Caldera. After check in, we were off with our map to explore Santorini. 

One of the first things that we did in Santorini was rent a quad!! Since it was just two of us we decided on renting a bike rather than a car. And to be more comfy, we took a 4 wheeler. This was an experience altogether. It was great fun to see Amar try his hand at something new. How we got honked at by all the vehicles, when we drove at just 20 kmph, not giving way nor speeding up!! J With the advice of our hotel, we had lunch at Mama’s house. We thought that we would be greeted by a really sweet person, but our experience was just the opposite. The food was good, but the service was grumpy.

The best part about Santorini was to travel around the small island. Although there were buses, we were discouraged from taking them. So renting a vehicle was our best option. The entire island had one arterial road which leads to most of the tourist spots. So with our map in hand and our helmets on, we were off to some of the beaches of Santorini. Since it was almost 2 pm, we decided to skip Kamari beach & ancient Thira, and heading to Perissa beach. This was a 20 min drive from Fira. It was real easy to get there as there were direction signs throughout. This was in the south end of the island, where they have black sand. Perissa beach was really interesting as the beach was entirely made up of tiny black sand particles. But the floor of the sea shore was not that inviting for a swim. The sea shore was too rocky, so we ended up just sitting on the beach, rather than taking a dip. There were a couple of places, where they were providing jet skis, banana boat rides, but since it was the end of season, we did not see anyone taking these rides.

The next stop for us was, the Red Beach. It took us about 10 min to reach there. On the way we could see the breathtaking view of Fira town from the other end of the island. This was great, as we could see the entire ocean in front of us, the Caldera & Fira town from the other end of the island. This was where we stopped to take pictures. As we started to move our quad got stuck in the sand, and the more we tried to move it, the more we got stuck. Luckily, a local on a quad, stopped to help us out. As we reached the Red Beach or at least the board which said red beach, we were actually confused, as all we saw was the edge of the cliff, and no beach. We were told to go up a small hill, and viola, on the other side was this amazing façade of a Red mountain, at the base of which was really a beach!!! They say that it’s called red beach because of the red hill. It was a small trek to go to the beach, and this place was a small stretch of reddish black sand. It was not as rocky as Perissa beach, so we could swim freely.

It was almost 5 pm by now, and we wanted to head out to an old Lighthouse that was marked in the map. We wanted to catch the sunset. So from the Red Beach we headed to the lighthouse. Or at least that’s what we thought. Driving around the island was real fun, as we could stop wherever we wanted, to take pictures or just enjoy the view. There were a number of spots, which had a sunset view. Since we did not find the lighthouse, we just decided to stop at one of the cafes to enjoy the sunset. I wouldn’t say that it was the most amazing sunset, but it was good. Once the sun was down, it started to get a little cold. So we headed back to our hotel to freshen up and explore the town of Fira. We were in the water the entire day, but still couldn’t resist the temptation of jumping into the swimming pool at our hotel. We were the only crazy couple who swam in the chill evening. But we thoroughly enjoyed it. We then walked through the town of Fira at night & were surprised to see most of the shops open at 10pm. It was truly a tourist’s paradise I would say.

The next day we had to catch a boat to take us to see the Volcano & Hot springs. Before that we wanted to explore the town of Fira during the day. So we headed out at about 8 am. We walked though the town, and was amazed at the inside streets of Fira. Apart from the main road, where the bus station & all other vehicles ply, there is a part of Fira town which is non-motorable. This is the beauty of the place. Small lanes, filled with souvenir shops, jewellery shops. There were innumerable restaurants, almost all overlooking the sea. We saw the cable car to the old port moving up & down. So we decided to go to the old port. We had a choice of cable car, walking or a ride on a donkey. I was not too keen on a donkey, so we decided to walk down. Initially I thought it was fun, until I came to the donkey station, where all the donkeys were on the steps. I was petrified that one of them was just going to kick me. I actually read about this, but did not feel it until I was there, wondering how to shoo them away without scaring them and getting through them was an experience I can say. The rest of the way was uneventful!! The old port was just another port for the small boats to dock. The big ferries, dock at the Athinios port.

We got back to Fira town in the cable car. It took about 5 mins to reach the top. We headed back to our hotel, to be taken to the port for our trip to the Volcano. Our first stop was Nea Kameni, a small volcanic island about 20 min by boat from Santorini. The last volcanic eruption, took place here in 1950. It was a trek all around the volcano’s rim. There were pamphlets available for information regarding the island. A well marked path took us all the way to the top of the island. The most interesting part of the tour was when our guide dug up a part of the soil which was still warm. We could even smell & see some green stains on rocks, which I guessed was sulphur. The island is mainly a tourist attraction and is uninhabited.   We spent almost 2 hours at this island. Next we headed to Palea Kameni which is the neighboring island of the volcano. There were hot springs at the Palea Kameni Island, and the boat took us for a dip in the Hot springs. At this part of the island, the water is a little orangish. After our swim in the warm springs at Palea Kameni, we were taken to Thirassia for lunch.

Thirassia was a pleasant surprise. It was a small island with the bluest of waters and a very beautiful windmill inviting us at the port. The approach to Thirassia was very beautiful. We had a sumptuous meal of Pita & Gyros as we enjoyed the sound of the splashing water. We had about an hour to spend, so we decided not to head up to the town. After lunch, we walked all along the shore and found a nice & cozy spot to sit and dip our legs in the water. As temptation always prevails, we actually went into the water to swim, with all our belongings right at the water’s edge. As we enjoyed the clear blue water and the small fish swimming around us, the water turned violent. As the water splashed on the rocks on the water’s edge, so did we. And with the splashing of water, our belongings were soaked!! By the time, we managed to get back on the shore, our shoes were also soaked. In all this chaos, we realized very late that it was time to leave. With our shoes in our hand, cold body and bare feet we had to scramble back to our boat on a path filled with small and pointed stones. This was an ordeal for us. Luckily our boatman realized this, and waited for us. 

Once on board, we got back to our groove and were ready to explore the town of Oia which was our final stop. Oia or Ia as they call it, is the most beautiful town in Santorini. The pictures that we see of Santorini which are plastered in all websites, is that of Oia. When we entered Oia, we were in another world. The entire town was non-motorable and had these neat small streets. And in this town we really saw the white & blue landscape. The town was in the northern most tip of the island and had a wonderful view of the Sunset. Most tourists flock the town of Oia at sunset. Everyone scrambles to get the best view to take their photographs. The houses in Oia were small called ‘yposkafa’ and there were numerous churches along the cliff. The best location to view the sunset is the castle. We walked around the entire town and found a great sport to capture the sunset and also the quintessential picture of Santorini with the church domes. We really enjoyed the town of Oia, as the sun set upon the evening sky.

We even got to see a couple of brides & grooms take their wedding portraits right at the same time. The view was spectacular and the architecture of the place brought out some amazing pictures. By the end of the day, we had seen what Santorini was all about. We took a bus from Oia to our hotel, freshened up and had dinner at the market square. We had pizza, bought some souvenirs and called it a day. Writing about it now makes me think that Santorini, is beautiful after all!!! J

We were much more relaxed the next day as we had to catch our ferry to Mykonos only by 11am. So we had a nice relaxed breakfast and left for the port to catch our high speed ferry to Mykonos. It took us about 2 hours to reach Mykonos. The town of Mykonos is not at a height like in Santorini. So we could see the famous windmills as we approached the port itself. Just like the other islands, Mykonos also had the typical white architecture. We decided to stay in Mykonos town, Chora (as they call it) as it was close to the port. We had the most spectacular view of the sea & the windmills from our room at Ilio Maris hotel. Ironically we were staying only for a night. The room gave us the feel that we were actually at a beach. We found a nice place to eat near our hotel & then headed out to explore the town.

The most fascinating thing about the main village of Chora was that most of the streets were non-motorable. It was the most beautiful small town I had ever seen. The small paved streets were extremely neat and colorful. We walked around the town and reached the port, where the boats to Delos were available. That’s where we felt the cold wind hit us. It was the windiest day in Mykonos. Since it was almost 5 pm, we decided not to visit the beaches on the other side of the island. We just wanted to enjoy Mykonos town. So we walked through Little Venice to the Windmills. Little Venice is this part of the island which is something like Venice, but Venice is entirely something else. And there are about 6 windmills which are all along this small hill overlooking the sea. All along the water were innumerable restaurants. But this day was not good weather for these restaurants as the waves were crashing against the shore a lot, bringing a gush of water into the restaurants.

We heard that the beaches are the place to be if you want to party. But we decided to have a nice dinner at one of the taverns in Chora. We picked Niki, which was this small tavern with good sea food. I tried Risotto& shrimps for the first time & it was excellent. We decided to go to Delos the next day as we had a ferry to catch back to Athens by 2pm. So we walked to the port to take the first boat to Delos at 9 am. The boat ride lasted for 30 min. If you are not planning to spend your time in the beaches of Mykonos, Delos is a good option. Of course if you don’t have a guide, you wouldn’t understand anything about the place. Luckily, for us there were some guides at the entrance of the archaeological site, looking out for tourists. We found one such guide who charged us 10 € each and took us around the site and finally left us at the famous lion statues, which is the trademark of the Delos site. We then walked up to the museum where all the original archaeological statues were kept. Apparently the lions we see at the site are all replicas. We took the 12 pm ferry back to Mykonos, grabbed some lunch and headed out to the port.

This time we did not take the high speed ferry, but the normal one. This ferry was huge!! I have never travelled on a ship before, but this was as big!! We felt like we were in a plane, once inside. We had great air seats and so we dozed off for most of the journey. It was the last day of our trip. Tiredness finally started to kick in!! It took us almost 5 hours to reach Piraeus, Athens. We were famished by the time we reached our hotel.

The next day at Athens was just a day to roam the streets, shop for souvenirs and get to the airport. We walked through the Flea Market, which was really interesting. Looked for leather sandals, but did not get the right pair. So we just bought the famous Grecian urns & then had our lunch at this great place, Thanasis in the Plaka square. I finally tried Mousakka, which is like lasagna with eggplant, filled with calories!! The only thing we never got about to trying in Greece was Octopus!!! As we were getting out of Athens, the city was gearing up for a protest right at Syntagma square. So we were out of there just in time.

Greece was just wonderful. It is such a large country, with so much to see. I never ever thought that I would ever get the chance to visit Greece. We have never had the experience of such clear blue waters. It is one of the most beautiful holidays that anyone can take!!