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Published: August 19th 2010
After 27 hours in transit we did not, as you might imagine, arrive in Australia but on the beautiful Greek island of Samos.
We set off from Plymouth on the Megabus at 7.45am. Note to anyone needing to get to London from Plymouth cheaply: the only downside of the Megabus that we could find was that there is only one bus a day does the journey. It is quick (for a bus) at under 5 1/2 hours (both journeys were faster than advertised), clean and only stops at Exeter and again at London Victoria. At £8 each one way we really couldn't complain.
Anyway, back to our trip...we arrived at Victoria Coach Station and then caught the tube (cheaper than the Heathrow Express - are you starting to see a theme here?) to Heathrow. This is where the downside of the the Megabus kicked in. We were at Heathrow by 2.30pm which was a good three hours before check-in opened and six before our flight. We now know:
1. There are comfy sofas in Weatherspoons at Heathrow Terminal 1. Not comfy enough to manage even the tiniest amount of sleeping however.
2. New computer system plus check in
desks is a bad and extremely slow combination
3. It is impossible to post anything other than then thinnest of letters at Terminal 1...apparently if we had been at Terminal 3 it would have been an entirely different story... as a result my most recent Charing Cross sample accompanied us all the way to Greece. Then, of course, we had to send it back the way it had come.
4. The end ultimately justified the means.
And that was only the beginning of the waiting. Arrive Athens: 02.30 hours, Depart Athens: 07:40 hours. My bones are getting too old for sleeping on hard airport floors but I gave it a try anyway. 1 hour later sporting slightly less red eyes I felt remarkably unrefreshed and gave up. Later, I was heard to utter, quite loudly actually, " this is inhumane" and, at the time, it was.
Gregg and I are now determined to find an easier way to get to Samos on scheduled flights...it must be possible, it just must!
We finally made it, on time, exhausted and in need of a long cool shower. The shower was subsequently provided as was the clear blue sea, on
A giant ant
doing the ant thingtap, whenever we wanted it. We took to always being prepared to jump in to the nearest available patch of the Agean at the drop of a hat. The quickest way to cool down by far.
After 10 years of hearing all about it from Dad, finally we were able to experience Samos for ourselves.
Two things are immediate note were:
1. how unbelievably loud Samnotis cicadas are. And I mean LOUD.
2. The devastating affect of the 'wild' fires that had ravaged large parts of the island the night before.
I did say fires. When I called Dad from Athens whilst waiting to board our Samos bound flight he sounded somewhat surprised that we we due to be leaving Athens on time and advised me that he had had a 'bit of trouble' with fires the night before. For 'a bit of trouble' read fire reaching within about 10 metres of the apartment in Kampos and evacuation. The fires were more or less out by the time that we arrived but we did watch helicopters scooping water from the sea for an hour or so for a final damping down. The next worry for the
locals was that, if it rained, the ash would be washed down from the mountains and turn everything black. I guess that this would have been a major problem for the tourist industry. Kampos is tourism and not a huge amount else so "big problema".
Our 10 days in Samos were extremely laid back during which we effortlessly slipped from greek salad and tzatziki to more greek Salad an tzatziki to a dip in the sea and back again. We borrowed Dad's aged jeep one day and took a trip around most of the island. This was a 'look but don't touch' trip - you guessed it, to save money! Beautiful scenery, azure sea and sky and scorching 35 plus degree heat - as there was every day.
On other days we were taken to a neighbouring island - Samiopoula ( Alecos told me "semi-semi hawaii". Whether it is or not I have no idea - other than that there was a notable absence of surf, but it was stunning), Varsamos, Manolates and Karlovassi and Potami Beach.
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