Crete Part 4

So we decided that we need to go this beach way on the other side of the island called Elafonisi. It's apparently a 4 hour drive and everyone recommended not driving there and then back again in one day cause there was so much to see and do on the way. We agreed and headed out that morning.

The drive was awesome we stopped at a beach in a town called Skalita on the way for some swimming. We got in trouble from a lifeguard about swimming out too deep in the waves.

Just after we got in trouble.

That killed our good times at that place so we headed on the road again and our next stop was Hania. It was influenced by the Venetians who to took it over at some point so there's a lot of buildings and architecture that looks very similar to Venice, but we had been to Venice and it was a lot prettier so we wandered around a bit took some pictures, had a snack and we were off again down the highway!

Finally we made it to a town called Kissamos where we decided we would stay till the next day when we would head out to the mystical Elafonisi beach. We actually stayed in a really nice hotel, they only had one room left and it was looking out over the beach so, alas, we had to take it!

The beach in front of our hotel in Kissamos

It was cheap too probably cause it was a last minute sale, anyhow that was great, we had drinks at the pub right next to waves that would lap up and almost splash you while you were sitting there.

The restaurant strip in Kissamos where we had some drinky drinky!

The next morning we were off again!! To Elafonisi! Only we made another stop at another beach which was fantastic too! The water was colder than we thought it would be though, but the sand was nice and the sun was out. The only problem was the wind was out too and we were getting sandblasted by it. So we left that wonderful beach and headed for our final destination Elafonisi!!

We were told to take this old windy road there and we did and the drive was beautiful. We reached the peak and there was this little cafe randomly sitting there so we decided icecream was in order.

The Cafe!

We stepped out of the car and I've never seen wind like that! It was so strong I stumbled out of the car and narrowly missed my fingers getting slammed in the door as the wind pushed it closed! But that didn't stop us from having icecream. We ate our icecream and it turned out the owners doggy had puppies so not only did we have icecream we saw puppies!

So after our puppies and icecream back to the road again!

We made it to Elafonisi and it was beautiful but after all the amazing things we saw on the way, it didn't hold up as much. It was quite busy there and the wind was still blowing it's brains out so we stayed for a couple of hours had some good swims and with wind blown sand in places I didn't even know about we headed back to our hotel.

The funny thing is, I don't actually have a picture to do the beach justice either so you'll have to just imagine it.

Again, RENT A CAR in Crete!!

Crete Part 3

We got our car!!



So driving out of Hersonissos was a bit, shall we say eyeopening...I had only witnessed the driving here from busses and walking but when you're actually driving here it's insane! I had the car for like 10 minutes and was driving down this one road (I use the term road loosley, as it was smaller than the size of a vancouver alley), but there's scooters parked on the side of the road and a huge tourbus comes down it, I pull over and this bus is, no joke, like 3 inches from the car, I actually had to move the car closer and closer to the wall as it pulled past us to avoid a large scrape down the side.

Other than the lack of space and the winding one lane mountain roads, it was the best thing we could have done. The first day with our rental car we drove up to this plateau where a lot of real villages are with no tourists, just quaint little town after quaint little town. Before reaching these quaint little villages we did find however the Homosapien museum!! That's right, the place where you can check out homosapiens and their history right in this little building on the way up the mountain. So we stopped had a bite to each and had (as they boasted) "The best cuppucino in greece!" It was actually really good. Also on the menu they had Special "Homo Sapien" I had no idea you could get Homosapien with cheese!


Anyhow, during that first day with the car we: saw a really incredible natural cave, drove through countless little towns, we drove on a gravel road that made me feel like I was back home on the island again and made it to a beach called Matala. Bonnie had read about there being a redsand beach there but it was on the other side of these "rocks" so when we arrived to set out to climb over the "rocks" and get to this cool red beach.



The "rocks" as it turned out was a small mountain, it was only about a 1/2 hike but the sun was beginning to set so we had a short time swimming there (which was fantastic) and then went back over to have dinner on the other side before we had to hike in the dark.

A view of the beach from the top of the "rocks"

The beach, with the cliff that housed hippies in the 60s (John Poser??)

It was crazy during dinner we found out that our cook was from Nanaimo so he came up to talk to us and during the course of that conversation the people who were eating behind us were from Vancouver and they were on the honeymoon too! So we shared some stories and stuff laughed and went back home.

Anyhow the moral of the story is, if you're in Crete...RENT A CAR!! There's no better way to see it.

Crete Part 2

Crete 2:

All my life I've loved the legend of the Minotaur and so we headed over to Knossos on the bus. It's the acheaological site of the palace of King Minos and the site according to acheologists, where the myth of the mintoaur spawned from. Apparently the word Labyrinth is two words meaning House of Axes, but people who visited or came after transalted that to mean, a complicated palace. The palace had over 1000 rooms and to people seeing it for the first time thought that it was a maze and so the translation shifted from House of Axes to maze. Anyhow, it was a very interesting tour and we had a great time learning about all the crazy technologies that the Minoans had. 5000 years ago the minoans had fresh water piped from the hills and a sewar system built under the floor of the palace to hide the smell. I for some reason though the first aqueducts were built by Romans but these guys had it all before hand.

Throne of King Minos

Anyhow, that's my garbled history lesson, but it was informative and cool to see!

That night, we wandered around town trying to get our bearings and basically took it easy. It's a nice place and I found a little cafe that serves the best panekoken ever! In the evening we wandered down to crazy town to check it our for real and holy crap, it was nutso down there. There must have been like twenty or thirty nightclubs in a row all pounding out the music, we wandered the whole strip and walked back. It was entertaining, but not what we came to Crete for so the next day we decided to rent a car!

Probably what everyone else on this crazy street was seeing...

Crete!!

Holy sorry for the long time without an update! We've been busy since we landed on Crete and this hotel doesn't have internet access in the room can you belive it?!! Ah well, more reading.

First of all it's been fantastic here and we've done so much that we're going to do back order updates since we can't cram all of it in just one update!

The beginning of our trip was interesting. First off, apparently I'm nerotic when it comes to reaching our destination on time and in one piece! The things you find out about yourself when you're travelling. I was stressed out because we arrived at night and we had a long bus to take from Iraklio to Hersonissos and he didn't have a clue where in Hersonissos this hotel we were staying at was, we were counting on a Taxi once we reached it.

So lets start with the bus! The kid loading our luggage was trying to get us to put our backpacks on the bus as well as the suitcases we had, which was a first time ever on this trip that we were being not only asked but demanded to put these below. First of all we had all our memory cards and cameras and exsessories in there for them so I'm thinking over my cold dead body are these leaving my sight. So Bonnie and I refused to leave them and he said that the "Busdriver demands it!!" So when he left we asked the busdriver and he said "Ok take them on the bus." So we did. But that wasn't the last we heard from the kid, he was the ticket ripper also on the bus (the guy who hands out and sells tickets once you're on there and rips them if you already have one) anyhow, so he comes down the aisle to rip our tickets and sees we still have our bags! This did not make ticketripper happy so he's all like "What is that!?" We said the busdriver said it was ok so he runs down the aisle back to the busdriver and says something and the busdriver says something to him and he's doesn't talk much to us after that.

When we arrived in Hersonissos we were like "Oh god, where in the hell are we?!" There were drunk 20 something guys and gals staggering all over the place and the street was hopping with music and cars and busses and people of all sorts. Luckily we found out from the cabby that we were staying just up the hill from the town which is much more quiet and quaint.

So our hotel here is awesome and big and we make our own breakfasts and coffee, but the coffee I'm finding in greece isn't so good as in Italy so when I get home I'm having the biggest cup of joe that a barista will make me!

So anyhow, we made it here safe everything is fine and we'll update again with what we did next as soon as we can.

Fira on Santorini...

OH MY GOD!!

View from the patio just ourside our door!!

So we arrive in Fira, just a little community HANGING OFF THE SIDE OF A FREAKING MOUNTAIN!! It's awesome here, I actually don't think that describes it fully, it's literally breathtaking. The view from everywhere is out over the ocean where you can watch the sunset in the distance.

When we first arrived at the hotel (it's called the Athina) we were brought to our room and were a little bit upset because it looked much like a Hobbit Hole. I was picturing having a great view from the room out over the water but our room had a tiny little window that looked to the mountainside and the front door looked to the patio. So I complained for my second time on this trip. But when you're paying for something and you're thinking it's one thing and you get there and you're dissapointed then why not complain!?!

Hobbit Hole

Anyhow they did move us for the next two nights of the stay and the difference between the rooms was insane! Apparently they're the same price, but this one had its own patio and the view from the door was out over the water. So if you are looking for staying in Fira at the Athina ask for rooms 8 or 9, they both have a patio on them, we were in 8 and it was great, but 9 would be ideal it's a tiny bit more removed.

Room 8

Food here can be outrageously expensive, but we found this one little place that was pretty reasonable, it had pretty good food and an amazing view, but as soon as you eat somewhere with a view you pay for it and the problem is everywhere has a view!

We've had a really relaxing time here. I don't ever remember being this calm and just able to sit for forever doing nothing but listening to birds and reading. When we get too hot, we jump in the pool swim up to the edge look out over the caldera into the horizon. We did a big walk from our hotel along the walkways and streets and it was amazing every corner has a panoramic view of the volcano in the middle. This is apparently where Atlantis was before the volcano's huge erruption decemated the entire island.

A view from sitting at the poolside

Tonight we just went out to a town on the tip of the island of Santorini called Oia (20 mins away) to watch the sunset. Apparently its supposed to be amazing.

It is.

It was beautiful and we had a perfect seat to watch it. We found a little bar and paid way too much for a glass of Sangria to watch it, but it was worth every second.

View from our sunset in Oia

Anyhow, our stay here is almost done and we're sad to go, but the next place is Crete and that should be just as relaxing, but anywhere from now on will be hard to compare to the beauty of this place.

We have a million more pictures, but you'll have to wait till I can see them better myself.

Take Care we'll see you soon!

Love Jason and Bonnie!

Bring Money or Wear Running-shoes

This is from Bonnie (mostly):

So we went to this restaurant in the neighboring village (15-20 minute walk). We had read about it on trip advisor and were heading there to check some others out that had been recommended to us....so we ended up at this place, Meteora. We ordered wine and when we got it the waiter spilled it! He was very apologetic cleaned up our table and successfully poured us new glasses. We finally got around to tasting this very Greek wine called Retsina and let me tell you the first flavours that swirled through our tastebuds were facinating. Bitter comes to mind, and so does mould with a kind of dirt-like aftertaste. Jason doesn't complain about much, but he wasn't about to pay for wine that tasted that badly.

The owner, this crazy lovely woman named Irene, got us a different bottle, but gave her waiters a lecture in front of us about how if a toursit orders this wine, to tell them it has a very specific taste (dirt).

We ordered our food and all was fine...

...until....

Jason realized that he hadn't brought any money. It was still in the camera case at the hotel!!!! So we ate, I mean what's the point in ruining a prefectly good dinner by running back during it, so afterwards he ran in his flip flops back the 15 minutes to get the money and then ran back! (P.S. don't run in flipflops for further than 100 meters or so)

While he was running, I was picking out desert and had an ouzo for both of us for his return. We ordered our desert, these lovely ice cream concoctions and I went to the bathroom.

Little did I know that when your desert comes Irene comes running out the back shouting "FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!" as she sprints through the tables with ice-cream topped with a sparkler so everyone in the restaurant looks to see the commortion. Well you can imagine that she was a little upset when she got to the table and I wasn't there!!! So she dissapeared for a moment and just as we were about to dig into our ice-creams the kitchen door flings open again and here comes Irene yelling FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! FIRE! again.


Never a dull moment...

The Honeymoon Begins!!

So the stay in Athens was less than spectacular. However on the last day we said screw this city and it’s dirty streets and crazy people and took the ferry to a little island called Aegina off the coast of Athens and spent our last day lounging on the beach where I tried my first taste of BBQ Octopus which was fantastic.

I was not sad to say goodbye to the room we had in Athens, you could hear everything all night long and we didn't sleep much, the whole place was marble tile and there were two children staying across the hall who decided using the hallway as a playground at 11pm at night so the sounds of screaming and giggling echoed like the Pantheon (see how I used a recent experience to create a simile right there??)

After three crazy sleepless nights we caught an 8 hour ferry from the port of Athens to Santorini. Man the skill those ferry drivers have is crazy. It’s essentially like pulling an e-brake on a Zomboni and parking it perfectly between the goal posts. They drop an anchor just offshore and crank the engines till the backend swings around in a big sweep and they back-in so the cars can offload.

Anyhow we had to get up at 5 am which after not sleeping much was tough, but we made it nonetheless and found out that we had somehow, when we booked online, bought Business Class tickets so we had a comfy lounge to sit in for the ride which was nice, we also had waiters for if we wanted something to eat, it was a classy ferry experience. We had a cheeseburger each too which was what the doctor ordered!! It was awesome to have a tiny taste of home after eating nonstop pizza, pasta, gyros and greek salad (not to say the food hasn’t been fantastic, it was just nice to have a little unhealthy dose of home!)

What's left of our greasy burgers of awesomeness!!

Buisness Class Crib

Me losing by one point at Buisness Class Crib!!

The view of Santorini was breathtaking as we approached the port. It's a volcano so the walls of island raise straight up out of the water and there are towns literally resting on the tops of these amazing cliffs!

Right now were' in a small town called Perissa on the other side of the island where there's a nice black beach, the sand is actually black especially when it’s wet and we just finished walking the entire length of it, this was after sleeping 12 hours straight!!

Our hotel here in Perissa is fantastic, they upgraded our room cause we’re honeymooners and I’ve got a cough so one of the girls working here had her sister pick me up some medicine on the way into town before her shift at the hotel. The locals here are amazing too, we went to the grocery store to buy some necessities (beer and cookies) and the cost was like 22 euros or something, I gave him a twenty and I’m digging into my wallet for the extra 2 dollars and he’s like “Forget it, it’s ok have a great day!” I’ve never seen anyone round anything down before!

Anyhow, our hotel is a great place with a pool and only a couple steps away from the beach. I highly recommend anyone who wants a cool getaway to come to this place, it’s a dream. It’s a little Greek surfer town without the surfing. The place we’re staying is called Kouros Village and it’s in Perissa, tell your friends.

After staying here we're going to be up on the caldera for 3 nights which will be a little more upscale than our little surfer town, but just as relaxing I’m sure!

So begins our Honeymoon the crazy adventuring is done...

Take care!