We flew from Crete to Athens, picked up another rental car, and headed northwest to Kastraki. My husband had found a great deal on a hotel there, but because we had so many places to visit, we only stayed for one night, which was a shame for a couple of reasons. Continue reading
Greece
Crete, Greece
From Santorini, we took the ferry over to Crete. The plan was to spend our three mornings in a private cooking class, then visit a few nearby towns by bus in the afternoons, but that didn’t work out. During the first “cooking” class, we made a salad and some tomato-topped bread. No joke. For the second, the teacher was half an hour late; we were on the verge of leaving when she finally arrived, but after expressing our unhappiness with the state of things, we went ahead and did the second class, and made a few things like stuffed veggies and three different arrangements of spanakopita – though all with pie crust rather than phyllo!? While it was much better than the first class, overall we were still pretty unhappy, so we canceled the third. Continue reading
Santorini, Greece
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| Red Beach |
After Athens, we flew to Santorini. Given the fact that Greece is made up of more than 1,000 islands, you’d think it would be more economical to get around by ferry, but in fact the flight was cheaper and considerably faster – and it even included breakfast!
We didn’t have any particular reason for choosing Santorini over any of the other beautiful islands Continue reading
Athens, Greece
After our weekend of driving and wine tasting, we spent 5 nights in Athens, in a clean, non-descript hotel in a bad part of town – or so people said. We chose the hotel because it was cheap and convenient: located near Viktoria Station, a metro stop on the same line as the school where we took our Greek classes. While I wouldn’t describe the area as seedy exactly Continue reading
Greek Lessons
Most of our traveling is to places where we speak the language, and of course when we don’t, we can usually fall back on English. This is the case in Greece as well; since it’s the only Greek-speaking country, the vast majority of Greeks are (more or less) fluent in English. But since my husband and I are both language lovers, and enjoy the surprised yet pleased reactions of native French, Spanish, and Italian speakers when we are able to communicate in their language, I thought of a new twist for our trip to Greece: why not learn a bit of Greek? Continue reading
3 weeks in Greece
I’d been wanting to visit Greece pretty much forever. I love the food, and I’ve seen some photos of the islands that come close to my idea of paradise. So when Air France started offering direct flights between Nice and Athens (previously, you had to go via Paris, or some other airport that nearly doubled the travel time) my husband and I decided it was a sign. We originally wanted to take a cruise, but as we researched the options, we couldn’t really find one that fit – the boats are either enormous or enormously expensive. We wanted something smallish (maybe 200 people, max) and affordable. When we couldn’t find it, we decided to just travel the way we usually do: pick out some neat places to stay, rent a car, and visit other cool stuff in between. It usually works out pretty well. We decided to spend the first weekend driving around a bit, then return the car and spend 4 days in Athens, 4 days on Santorini, and 4 days on Crete, before returning to the mainland, renting another car, and visiting the northwestern part. All in all, it was one of the best trips of my life. Continue reading