Sea, sun and...well no sand really

Ah...6 glorious days sailing in the Greek Islands! Yep, been there, tick that box. What an awesome adventure.

ATHENS

We left Antibes on Friday lunchtime and arrived in Athens Friday night. On the Saturday we took a guided walking tour of Athens where we visited all the key sites, the Greek Parliament & the changing of the guards, the National Gardens, The Zeus Temple, Hadrian's Arch, The Plaka Area, The Acropolis and the The Parthenon. The tour and the history were interesting but Athens generally didn't do much for us. I guess a little more time might have changed our opinion perhaps.

Photo ops with the Greek National Guard...this wasn't to be our only run-in with the Greek Army...read on.

The changing of the guard - definitely inspired by John Cleese's School of Funny Walks!

Proof that we were at the Temple of Zeus & the Acropolis

THE REAL ADVENTURE

Athens; done...tick! Now off for the real adventure - sailing on the turquoise waters of the Mediterranean under the clear blue skies of the Greek Islands.

On Saturday afternoon we flew from Athens airport to the island of Samos. Samos is the birthplace of Pythagoras, the famous mathematician. We didn't get to see much of Samos itself because we arrived late and had to find our hotel, well actually we had to find out if the hotel even existed or indeed whether or not we even had a reservation. We had made the reservation via another hotel recommended by the sailing charter company but the recommended hotel didn't have any rooms left so they made a reservation for us at another place. We only had a name for the hotel, no phone number, no address, no email, nothing! So we arrived at the airport in Samos and gave the taxi driver the name of the hotel, Polykrates Hotel. Needless to say he had no idea where that was but after some further discussion with his compatriots we headed off, hopefully to the right place. And indeed the hotel did exist and thankfully we had a room for the night.

Then it was off for dinner which took the better part of two hours - nothing happens in a hurry in the islands! By then it was time for a kip so we would be ready for the early 11am start the following day. Cathy had to go out a little earlier in the morning and tackle (running) the biggest hill on the island not once, but twice. We had breakfast on the balcony of our little room overlooking the harbour before heading off to find our boat.

We found our boat, Anna Maria, and to our pleasant surprise it was not fully occupied. We only had the skipper, Iain, and his wife Jo plus one other Portugese / Canadian fellow, Tony. We were supposed to have another couple from France but they were having difficulties finding their way from Athens to Samos so the plan was to pick them up at another island the following day. The boat apparently has the capacity to take 10 people plus the crew, a total of twelve. In the end, after we picked our French couple, we only had 7 which made the trip a little more comfortable and personal.

We were shown to our quarters, given the run down on the operations of the boat, etc and headed off for the island of Agothonissi. When we arrived at Agothonissi we had to wait for the ferry to leave before we could dock for the night. So it was time to weigh anchor and try a swim those amazingly clear waters. After the ferry left we headed in and made camp for the evening. This became a ritual, sans ferry, for the rest of the trip; swim, dock, drink, walk, eat, return to boat and sleep on deck under the stars!

Agothonissi is only a small island with one fishing port and two tiny villages perched on the hillside. Cathy and I decided to head off for a bit of an afternoon stroll, but with Cathy's inherent fixation with the highest peaks of every place she goes to we ended up climbing to the top of the island where there wasn't much else other than goats and the odd army outpost!

We did, however, discover a few more hidden treasures of Agothonissi that our guides failed to tell us about - the full size astro turf soccer field complete with 6 blokes running around in budgie smugglers, two full size dirt soccer fields (right on the highest part of the island), oh and the real Greek military...

Whilst Cathy was showing off her pole dancing skills on the Greek flag I heard some yelling from behind. I guess the remotely located flag pole on the very top of the island has to be tended by someone...how were we to know it was the Greek army? Well perhaps the camouflage painted jeep was a dead give away. So there they were, in their watch tower, yelling "NO PHOTOS"! Upon further inspection there were guns, cannons and all manner of other miscellaneous military ordinance beneath camouflage netting and lots of razor wire too. And guess where the guns were pointing....at Turkey!! Needless to say we didn't hang around too much longer. Though I must say I believe Cathy missed her calling as an international espionage agent, taking photos of the cannons and stuff from her hip on the way back down.

That night we had dinner at George's taverna. Generally the walk from the boat to the local taverna on each island became our staple exercise the for the remainder of the week, besides a heap of swimming of course.

The next day we sailed to Patmos where we picked up our wayward French guests. There is a big monastery on Patmos built by the Crusader Knights in the 10th century, apparently the second most important religious centre for Greek Orthodoxy in the world. Legend has it that St John (as of Jesus and the Apostles fame) squirrelled himself away in a cave on Patmos where he was inspired to write the Book of Revelations. One thing to point out though, neither the monastery or St John's cave (the Holy Hole as it became known amongst our little group) are open on Monday afternoons - this we found out after cramming 5 people into a taxi for the ride up the hill to the monastery. Oh well at least we saw the traditional little village around the base of the monastery, had a beer at Jimmy's Balcony and got to know some of our other crew members a little better.

Afterwards we jumped in the dinghy and went over to a little rock called Kallikatsou where a bunch of hermit monks carved out caves and water holes and lived on the rock for several centuries. We climbed the rock, enjoyed a little wine and watched the sun go down. Then it was off to the local taverna for a meal and, well, more wine of course.

And from there it became pretty much routine; leisurely pack up in the morning, sail off to a swimming spot, swim, lunch, chill out, snorkel and then head off to the next island where we would dock for the night and head off for dinner at around 7:30 ish. Along the way we visited three other islands, Arki, Lipsos and Leros.

Arki boasts a permanent population of just 27 people and was the smallest island we visited. Needless to say that one was a sleepy little stay over. There is a nice little church on top of the hill but the scorching heat and the after effects from the Ouzo the night before prohibited that level of silly activity.

Lipsos is the island of the 42 blue domed churches. Apparently the island is owned by St John's monastery, the one I previously mentioned that was on Patmos. The story goes that some time back the church / monastery needed some cash so they started selling off bits of land on Lipsos. The land was cheap but there was a catch - if you bought land, you had to build a church on it! Hence the 42 churches. Not all are still active but the main one is a very pretty little church with some amazingly intricate light fittings, crucifixes and other bits & pieces.

We also had a bit of luck with the timing of our arrival on Lipsos; they were holding the annual Lipsi Wine Festival where for all of 1.50€ you got a souvenir glass that you could use to fill up with the local wine as much as you wanted. Now we use the term "wine" very loosely in this story; it was more like grape & sugar flavoured rocket fuel! I think the most anyone could keep down was two glasses - I had one & a half, the trees got the other half. Oh well at least we got our souvenir glass.

Along the way we got to visit some nice little bays and swimming spots. There was "blue lagoon" though I'm not quite sure why they call it that...

And then there was this great spot where you could swim through a short underwater cave to a concealed lagoon on the other side of the cliff, or for those of us more adventurous types there was always the option of jumping off the cliffs.

We finished the trip on the island of Leros, for two nights in two different locations. If memory serves me right too, the first night on Leros was the site of the ill fated flaming lamborghinis... Enough said of that then. After the first night Cathy and I, despite the ill effects from those damn lamborghinis, once again tackled the elements and made our way up 4,000,000,000 steps to visit a Byzantine castle on top of the island. Some of the remains from within the castle have been dated to around the 7th century BC - that's pretty old!

All in all not a bad way to spend a birthday. The last day & evening were my birthday. We had pizza that last night and then Cathy and I headed off early the following morning to catch a flight back to Athens and on towards home.

For those of you who would like to see more photos, I have made even more developments to deliver the highest quality multimedia for your viewing pleasure. This time we have not one, but two slideshows, with bigger pictures and better sound. Click here for photos from the islands and for Athens photos click here. Enjoy.

The next posting will be towards the end of September after our trip to Verona, Lake Garda and Lake Como in Italy and separate but overlapping visits from our respective parents.

Au revoir from the Riviera.