To explore
Ancient Greece outside of Athens, and to take a break from having to think of everything ourselves, we decided to take a three day tour. We dragged our bags through the streets of Athens to our pick-up point, but after watching all the other waiting tourists get picked up by other buses we discovered that our
coach was running on "Greek Time". Forty five minutes later, we finally joined our tour group.
There were some interesting characters in the group. There was
Roula, our tour guide, who was an
archaeologist, a linguist and a fabulous guide, and
Kostas our driver, who
manoeuvred the big bus through the narrow streets like it was a Mini Cooper. Then there were the other tourists. The Couple Who Was Always Late, The Lady with Hair the Colour of Vacuum Cleaner Fluff, The Indian Family Who Had to Video Tape Everything (Twice), The Young Honeymooners (dismayed by the twin beds in all the hotel rooms), The Grumpy Old Man with the Weak Bladder, the French Couple, and the French Canadian Couple (who were the only ones they could understand other than
Roula). There was the Young American Girl with the Annoying Laugh (travelling alone) and The Australian Cattle Farmer and his Wife (who found themselves unwittingly adopting her for the tour. To name a few!
The first day was fairly long. We saw the Corinth Canal, the Theatre of
Epidaurus, the ruins of Mycenae and the Tomb of Agamemnon. At lunch we discovered the joys of tour group meals as we were driven to an out-of-the-way restaurant/cafeteria. After lunch, we were taken to a "gallery of replicas" for "shopping activities" where we got a lecture on why we really had to buy the expensive vases, not the cheap ones. The hotel was "adequate", but thanks to our awesome travel agent we were one of the lucky few who got a free bottle of water. Dinner was also "adequate" and the conversation was a little stunted because we ended up sitting with the French couple.
On Day Two, after being picked up by the bus (20 minutes late, because of The Couple Who Was Always Late), we visited the beautiful site of Olympia, the birth place of the Olympic Games - this was Karina's favourite part of the tour, not least because of all the beautiful purple blossoms. Lunch was at another isolated tour group eatery, where we had very expensive slop masquerading as Greek food. We were even more annoyed to later discover that we'd been only a three minute walk from the the centre of town and dozens of reasonably priced cafes and tavernas.
The highlight of the afternoon was crossing the new bridge across the Corinthian Bay, where we were told where to point our cameras for the obligatory photo of the bridge, and then back on the bus and heading for Delphi. Dinner and accommodation was much improved on the previous night and we thought that Delphi was very quaint, if somewhat touristy.
On the last day, after checking out the ruins of Delphi, we wandered around the town some more and had a surprisingly good lunch. While most of the bus was doing a four day tour, we were only doing a three day tour and so had to join another bus (with a much less interesting guide and a very angry driver) for the trip back to Athens.
On the way we stopped at what could only be described as Carpet Town, where we could buy all the Greek and
Persian rugs we wanted. We even had the great luck of arriving while they were having a sale! Arriving back in Athens, we dragged our bags back to Hotel
Tempi for one more night before heading to the Greek Islands.
With a much more pleasent taxi (this time at 4am), we left Athens and then flew into the island of Santorini. As this was our first big rest stop, we had decided to go a bit more up-market - we'd booked at a luxury resort and the hotel had even offered to arrange a taxi. We were looking forward to being those glamourous people who are met at the airport by someone holding a sign with their name. So we were a bit dismayed when we couldn't see our name. The lovely hotel manager was so horrified that she had forgotten to book us the taxi that she spent the rest of our stay trying to make it up.
The resort was a set of 11 rooms/apartments just outside the village of Oia, overlooking the caldera and the volcanic islands in the centre. They served us a huge breakfast out on the terrace, which included amazing museli, a selection of meats and cheeses, all sorts of bread, croissants, muffins, honey, jams, fantastic Greek yoghurt (Karina will never again be able to face a low-fat tub of yoplait), a big fruit bowl and a pot of tea and a pot of coffee each. Best of all, it was all just for us, and it came every morning.
We decided that one activity a day, fitted in around pleanty or r&r, was more then enough. The day we arrived, we explored the village of Oia (basically the stereotypical Greek island village - tiny white buildings nestled tightly together with stairs and alleys leading everywhere). On day two, we took a boat ride out to the volcanic islands and jumped off the boat to swim out to some thermal pools (the Medditeranian being as cold as it gets, and the thermal pools being only slightly warmer). The third day was a strenous trip into Oia for relaxation massages (after which Simon was told he was the second most stressed person the masseure had ever met, based on the tension in his shoulders. Karina thinks it's more because of lugging our heavy bags for a month). On our last day, we took a trip to lie on the black sand beach at a place called Kamari, on the other side of the island.
As always, food was extremely important! Dinners included a selection of Meze (like Greek tapas) from an ouzori (traditional Greek pub), some Greek fare at a rooftop taverna in Fira, Santorini's capital, a great meal from a resturant hanging on the edge of a cliff in Oia, and €7.50 milkshakes made with Haagan-Daas ice cream. Of course, we also enjoyed a lot of local wines.
When we weren't exauhsting ourselves doing any of the above, you could usually find us relaxing by the pool, ordering cocktails and eating olives and cheese. If you ever find yourself on Santorini, we strongly suggest you stay at the Ikies Luxury Hotel. We had the smallest and most basic room (the Gardener's House), and they still made us feel like royalty. Santorini is yet another place that we would definitely like to visit again!
