Riomaggiore Streets - Photo credit to Kev (ain't he great? :)

Wednesday 19 September, 2001 (Monterosso - Fiumicino)

Got up earlier and did our laundry again today. It was pouring down in Monterosso, good thing we did the walk yesterday!

Some little old guy did our washing for us.. I think maybe we got ripped off ;) We had to wait a long long time in this weird arcade games room which adjoining a laundry and dark as all hell made it seem pretty foreboding. Looking back, that day must have been the only one where it rained during our whole holiday. And it wasn't even serious rain either.. more like a summer drizzle. Either way, it was very welcome.

The long train ride back to Rome was uneventful and boring (4.5 hours) and we ended up staying at a nearby hotel so that we could get up early the next day to catch our flight back to Athens. Missed breakfast, grrr.

Thursday 20 September, 2001 (Athens - Mykonos)

After getting to Athens we plonked about the airport arranging tickets home (thanks, Ansett!) and tickets to Mykonos. Eventually we got on this dodgy rustbucket propeller plane and flew over the Aegean Sea into Mykonos. We took a cab from the airport at about 4pm, and arrived here at the Apanema Resort shortly after.

Our room is beautiful! The view is so spectacular I can't take enough pictures of it! Let me tell you, the hotels in Rome sure could learn from these guys.

The whole place has the whitewashed houses with blue shutters built on the hill around the harbor. Our room is all white with blue washed furniture. It also has a balcony which has a great view and a crystal blue pool. On arrival they gave us little shrink wrapped slippers, a welcome plate of fruit and a bottle of water. (The water is not drinkable on the island). In Italy, we were lucky if they flung the room key at us on the way up the stairs!

Mark fell asleep soonafter our arrival, so I made the 2 min walk into town to get some gyros. The road I walked along had no footpath, and one side was half a mountain, the other a small brick wall with a sheer drop and the sea on the other side. It was windy and scary, cars would careen around the corner and I'd have to jump up on the wall to avoid being hit. Eventually I made it back to the hotel.

We munched on gyros for a while, drank some beer and kicked back, admiring the view. I had a little sleep and later on we walked into town to pay for our accommodation at the place that booked us the hotel. We got back to the hotel and ordered room service which was extremely expensive!

View from hotel room - Sunset in Mykonos

Friday 21 September, 2001 (Mykonos)

Went for a walk through town today, split up for a while and walk some more. I came back to the hotel and read for a bit, but was pretty tired and soon fell asleep. For dinner I went to the famous Niko's Taverna for dinner and had a wonderful meal of dolmades and lemon spinach lamb which was delicious. Trooped back to the hotel and went to bed exhausted.

Saturday 22 September, 2001 (Mykonos)

Today we caught the ferry to Tinos and had an hour or so there to wander the markets. The ferry was a Seajet and was pretty damn fast! Bought mum some Egyptian crap for her birthday, and Mark bought a godawful bongo drum :) Came back and decided to hang over at the hotel pool for a bit. We swam and drank beer and sunbathed a bit before tiredly having an afternoon siesta.

Got up at about 9pm and really felt like Chinese food so we walked into town and got successfully lost but eventually found our way. The streets of Mykonos were designed to confuse pirates in the olden days. I think these days pirates = tourists.

The food was pretty good but I was feeling pretty sunburnt and not too well so we went back to our hotel and I tried to sleep.

Sunday 23 September, 2001 (Mykonos)

Went to Platis Yialos beach today and laid out under the sun drinking cocktails. We caught the bus there which I swear would not fit another person on. When we got there, we decided to hire a little jet-ski boat for 2 people. About 5 seconds into the ride it broke down, so we opted to hire a jet ski, taking turns for 20 mins each. It so great! I've always wanted to have a go, so I'll definitely do it again.

After jet-skiing, we hired one of the beach lounges which is basically two banana lounges stretched out under an umbrella made up of thatched palm tree leaves. I had a strawberry daiquiri and lazed under the shade, quite content.

Eventually we went in the water which was just heavenly. After a bit of sunburn we went back to our hotel on the crazy bus. When we got back "Police Academy" was playing on the tv so we watched that until dinner. For dinner we trooped over to la Mexicana for some much needed mexican food. (We were having big time withdrawals!). We caught a cab home and the cabbie said that the whole island had English CNN and that we should have had it too. I whinged to reception that we couldn't get it on our tv, and they moved us to another room which had CNN. This was a double superior room, (free upgrade!) and was beautiful. We fell asleep pretty late after catching up on all the news.

Our hotel - The Apanema Resort

Tinos shoreline

Little Venice, Mykonos

Monday 24 September, 2001 (Mykonos)

Got up this morning to join a horseriding group. It was really hot by 10am and after finding a supermarket to buy some cigarettes, we found the stockman. We rode for about an hour and a half, Mark's horse Adonis being a general pain in the ass. We stopped on the beach for photos. Got back to the hotel with sore legs and backside and decided that that was enough exercise for one day and lazed about for the rest of it.

It was a nice quiet evening, and I spent it on the balcony of our room, with minidisc firmly in my ears, singing along and enjoying the sunset. Naturally, Mark could not resist the opportunity to film this rare event.. but unfortunately, it accidentally got edited from the holiday video ;)

Tuesday 25 September, 2001 (Mykonos)

Mark went to Delos Island this morning, I stayed on Mykonos as Delos didn't really interest me. I spent some time wandering the streets around Mykonos, looking at the shops. At about 1pm when Mark was due to return, I sat alongside the shore and ordered a savoury crepe and a coke. It seemed to be one of the most perfect days of my life. The sun was shining, it was warm but not too hot, the boats were coming in and out of the tiny harbor, the food was good and life felt great. The waiter even chatted me up, and invited me out to a club after he finished his shift. It was nice to be asked, but I respectfully declined.

In the afternoon Mark and I went scuba diving. Because we were unlicensed we were only allowed to go 4 meters deep, but for first timers like us, it was more than enough. At first I had some trouble teaching myself to breathe using the tanks underwater.. my reflex to use my lungs got me into a bit of trouble. Eventually I got it right and all was well. I did have a lot of trouble maintaining any kind of floating stability as my body would move up and down the depths with each breath I took (depending if I breathed deep or not).

We took a disposable underwater camera with us, and I had so much fun and it was such an experience that I'll be sure to do it again. We did the dive for about an hour and headed back to our hotel, exhausted.

Horseriding on Mykonos

Santorini shoreline - Houses at the top of the caldera

Wednesday 26 September, 2001 (Mykonos-Santorini)

Woke up early this morning and hurried to catch the ferry to Paros for connection to Santorini. The ferry was jam packed but the ride was fairly uneventful. In Paros we hung about a bit before being shepherded into a shaded and boxed in area on one side of the pier. Someone herded us all in there like sheep, then locked the gate behind us. It was very claustrophobic, so I let myself out the other end and went for a walk around. The ferry arrived and we clambered on board.

It was pretty boring on the ferry for most of the trip, but sailing across the caldera at Santorini was pretty breathtaking. We needed to catch a cab from the port to our hotel so we made sure we were one of the first off the boat. This meant that we had to stand in the off-load ramp area so I think we missed a lot of the view.

We got dropped off halfway up the hill near our hotel, but the road narrowed and from there on, we had to walk. It was hard going, especially since we had to climb some 70 odd steps down the mountain to our room with full packs on.

We collapsed exhausted on our beds in the pretty ordinary hotel room. I had a bitch and they promised to swap us with something better the next day. It did have a nice view, though.

We slept and lazed about for most of the rest of the day, and at night we walked the 70 odd steps up a sharp incline to go find some dinner. We pretty much ate at the first place we found, and the food there was generally ok. There were heaps of homeless cats around though, and as we ate they sat at our feet and meowed. I think I fed half my dinner to one of them.

Thuesday 27 September, 2001 (Santorini)

Today we organised a tour of the caldera and environs and walked around town for a bit. We were pretty tired even still so we trooped back to the hotel and spent some time by the pool.

Donkeys on Santorini

Friday 28 September, 2001 (Santorini)

Went on our tour today. First stop was some island with a supposed active volcano on it. Hiked the most difficult hike so far, I think. Walked around on dried up lava and went back to the boat.

Stop two was the hot springs where I went for a swim and Mark videotaped. The water was gorgeously warm, but everything smelled like sulphur. Being in the cloudy water made me a little nervous so I got out.

After this it was back on the boat, next stop the shit-boring-two-restaurants-only island of Thirassia. The town of Thirassia, like Santorini is on top of a huge hill. A path went from the harbor to the "town" (the 1st restaurant) but it was a very steep climb up so we elected to take donkeys. The experience was quite funny, the only difference between donkeys and horses was the donkeys seemed to shit more.

Finally got to the top and decided to eat at the islands second restaurant for lunch. Fed a lot of my lunch to the stray cats hanging around as the fish I'd ordered was a bit suspect.

Decided to walk around and explore, but the island was like a ghost town - nothing to do and no one there who was not a tourist. We walked down the hill back to the harbor (a difficult walk to say the least!) and ate chocolate ice creams on the beach. Caught the boat back to Fira and went to bed exhausted and very sunburned.

Saturday 29 September, 2001 (Santorini)

Woke up this morning intending on buying gifts for our friends and family on this last day of our trip. Walked around from about 11am to 10pm that night trying to find gifts, often returning to the same stores twice. (One store saw us no less than 10 times!) Eventually found a chess set for Marks dad, a stone egg for Marks mum, some jewelry for me and other gifts for everyone else. Went to bed, absolutely exhausted yet again.

Artesano - Some of the nicest jewellery on Mykonos!

Ahhh.. sweet giver of life (AM)

Sunday 30 September, 2001 (Going home!)

Got up at 4.30am this morning to catch a cab at 5.30 for our 6.45 flight to Athens. Arrived in Athens feeling really tired and absolutely, positively, sick and tired of planes. At that point I was quite happy if I never saw a plane again in my life.

We sat at the airport and had some time to kill. After going through customs, we realised that on the other side there were no bookshops. There were duty free shops, but no bookshops. And of course, once you pass customs you cannot go back. I was livid as it was 10 hours to Bangkok and I needed something to read!

I had some coffee at McDonalds with the last of the Greek drachmas I had, smoked a few cigarettes and we did the ending monologue for the video tape. Finally, we boarded our flight to Australia.

The time seemed to pass quicker on the way back, I spent a lot of it sleeping as much as I could. Again, the service was shit, the food ok (if you could get some) and the smell coming from the rear of the plane where the flight attendants were smoking was driving me nuts! (It was a strictly non smoking flight).

The end. (til next year!)

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