Greece: Delos

Our first day on Mykonos was barely spent on actual Mykonos!  We decided to get our hard core touristing out of the way right away and hopped the boat to Delos.

The very bumpy, crashy, rocky, nauseating boat to Delos.  Interesting to say the least!  But the ride was worth it because we were met with this amazing ancient landscape as soon as we stepped off the boat…

The earliest inhabitants of Delos are recorded at 2500 BC!  When was the last time you walked around a city that old?!  Blew our minds.

What amazed us the most is that this is a completely open site.  The public is welcome to walk all over the island among the excavations…we encountered a few basic ropes blocking paths, etc. but other than that it’s open to the elements and exploration.

Some of the bigger artifacts on the grounds are indeed replicas but the originals are almost all housed in the on site museum along with most of the smaller pieces like dishes and weapons.

Yes, this is what you think it is…

The theatre.  Quite remarkable.

According to the brochure: “It is estimated that at the beginning of the 1st century BC, some 30,000 people were living on this little island…”  (approx. 5km long and 1300m wide). 

Stunning.  Hot, dusty and sweaty.  We earned our gelato that day!

Greece: More Mykonos

After a couple of days of touristing around Mykonos-town and Delos (stay tuned for that post) it was time to soak up some sun and relax on one of the beaches!  Based on recommendations we opted for Platis Gialos for our first day.

We spent the whole day on loungers under umbrellas enjoying the sun, the heat, the view, and our new found treat…the Cappuccino Freddo!  Sadly that gloriously beautiful water isn’t very warm…damn you September!

For our second beach day we opted for Paradise Beach.  While it was also lovely and warm it wasn’t quite as nice as Gialos. 

Public transit was incredibly easy to use and reasonably priced.  They rock big tour buses for transporting folks around the island…can’t beat that!  On our way back from Paradise we got off the bus early and tracked down this Starbucks.  We were soooo weirded out that this existed and had to stop to check it out.

It was hands down the worst iced coffee I had on the whole trip…LOL.  But of course I got the mug!

The sunsets were perfect every night!

The cruise ships arrived in droves on our last morning.  We spent the time sipping our cheap wine on the beach watching the shuttle boats go back and forth before heading for our next ferry adventure.

Those waves made for an ‘interesting’ fast boat to Santorini. Gulp.

Greece: Mykonos

On our second day in Greece we had to be up before the sun to meet our taxi and take our first ferry ride.  We were so stoked we didn’t even care that we had to miss our free hotel breakfast in order to make our Mykonos boat.  Besides, we got to see the sun rise!

The ferry was massive and actually quite nice (super comfy seats for those of us with assigned seating…unassigned is a bit of a crazy shitstorm) and we had what I think might have been the best cappuccinos of the whole trip.  For the most part it was smooth sailing and thankfully when it wasn’t I had dozed off due to our super early wake-up call.

The trip from the mainland to Mykonos was something like 5 hours, which included three other island stops along the way.  We would go stand outside on one of the upper decks and take photos at each port because these were our first glimpses of what we expected Greece to really look like.

Once we got to Mykonos I really felt like we’d arrived!  Our super cute hotel was exactly what we had hoped for.  White washed with blue trim, facing the water, close to town, and the super friendliest staff.

Each room was actually a bungalow of sorts with it’s own patio.  Our patio was huge!  Tiffaney was so excited she was bouncing up and down.  :)

We immediately headed out to explore.  First stop: dipping my toes in the Aegean Sea (it’s freaking cold).

Turns out we were a five minute walk to the windmills, and only another five into Mykonos Town.

Little Venice…

This town ended up being our favourite part of the whole trip.  So quintessentially Greek to us, easy to navigate (even though it’s a maze), and fun to explore.

We took ourselves out for a delicious dinner with sparkling wine and made sure to catch our first island sunset right from the privacy of our own patio.

Good thing we had five whole days there.  Love.

Greece: Athens

Our flights to Greece were on time and uneventful.  Two stops…Vancouver and Montreal…were perfect for stretching our legs, sending last minute texts and Facebook updates, and making sure to enjoy something other than airline food between the long legs in the air.  After something like 22 hours of travel we arrived in Athens to begin our adventure.

The first thing we noticed after leaving the airport and heading out (onto the REALLY nice freeway) in our pre-booked taxi was how brown everything was.  I guess the part about it being arid and hot there sort of escaped our West Coast brains.  Once we got off the highway and into the city things started to get pretty real.

If we’re being honest we both had a little internal panic attack and culture shock.  Outside the touristy Plaka Athens is a big damn urban city with crazy drivers, lots of graffiti and garbage, and from what we could see…no English signs!  Once we neared our hotel we started to relax though.  Much cuter cobblestone streets and a lot of pedestrians made things seem far more manageable.  And once we wandered out of our hotel and got adventurous any fears we had just melted away.

We caught our first views of the Acropolis…

Stumbled through miles of street markets, wandered with teams of other tourists, and encountered the first of many excavated ruins…

Happily enjoyed our first Greek meal…

The tomatoes were so good we damn near cried.  And the feta.  And the olives.  And the tzatziki.  And the pita.  Did I mention the tomatoes?

It’s actually possible that was the best meal of our entire trip…and we ate a lot of good food.

We enjoyed the glorious sun and more beautiful architecture…

And then there was this…

The view from the patio on top of our hotel.  We may or may not have enjoyed our first sips of Greek wine while just sitting there with our mouths gaping open.

Nothing like a sunset-washed Acropolis to start your trip off right.

Even if we did have to get up at 6am for our ferry to Mykonos. *groan*

Girl’s Greek Getaway

As most of you already know, one of my best friends, Tiffaney, and I just went away for a fabulous two-week vacation in Greece.  While I have decided to take a much needed break from daily food blogging I couldn’t very well completely abandon those of you who have been waiting for a recap!  I don’t promise much of a write-up but I do believe most of the pictures will speak for themselves.  I have narrowed down my 1700(!) photos to a couple hundred of my faves and will break those down into posts based on location (and a couple of fun collages).  We had a really fabulous time and I’m happy to share our excitement!