The last few days sailing around the Greek Islands

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We arrived in Santorini and it was as beautiful as it is in the photos with the blue domes and the white buildings. We found an amazing spot to have lunch, and of course a drink, which seemed to hang off the cliff front - probably why the bill was quite large for what we had but hey ho we are on holiday. Not much else to tell you about apart from it is a stunning island.



The next day we sailed to Monemvasta which we have been to once before and it is a walk to get to the walled city which does not allow cars. Once again what a pretty place, not as touristy as Santorini but beautiful - again we had a spot of lunch on a balcony overlooking the sea. You would think we would have had enough of viewing the sea but to be honest you never have enough of looking at the sea - well I don’t I must admit.



Oh I forgot to mention the sister ship to Star Clipper is called Star Flyer and it was already at anchor in Monemvasta so it was a spectacular sight with two tall ships in the harbour. We also noted that there were a lot of motor homes parked up but decided we do not think we will be bringing our motor home over to Greece but never say never - stranger things have happened.



We decided earlier on in the week that we would have a returner’s bottle of Prosecco tonight so Albert, Helen, Mike and I had our bottles with our dinner as Eric and Sue were on the captain’s table - so you can imagine two bottles of Prosecco down it was quite a night.



Onwards and upwards as we were supposed to be visiting the island of Hydra but the captain decided that he would change the itinerary due to the weather forecast as it appears Hydra does not have any surrounding islands which meant we would be buffeted by the winds. So instead we sailed to Poros. I must admit I had not even heard of Hydra or Poros so to me there was no problem. Anyway Poros is an island as well as being part of the mainland and we went to the island first and had a walk along the promenade and saw octopus hanging up drying out for lunch. We only had a coffee at this cafe as we decided to get back on the tender and have lunch on the mainland which was a great idea in the end. At first I did not think this as it is really small but we found a taverna where we had the most amazing food = not sure I will be going down to dinner tonight as I am totally stuffed.



Well guess what I made it down to dinner and it was great with the show the crew put on, waving all the flags was amazing. The only thing is we have one passenger who I have never mentioned before in my blog that I totally took acception to tonight - she somehow loves pirates which everyone to their own but to stand up when the crew were celebrating countries around the world with “we are the world, we are the people” and she is standing there waving a pirate flag to me was totally disgusting as it made out that the crew thought pirates were okay - rant over but feedback will be given that this is not acceptable from my perspective.



I must admit I am getting really fed up with the wi-fi on board the ship. You have to pay for minutes and then it is really difficult to get on - also sometimes you log out to save your minutes and it does not log you out!! I hope when we get into the hotel in Athens the wi-fi is a lot better - fingers crossed ??



Well the wi-fi in the hotel is great after taking me ages to log-on but hey ho back in civilisation.



So the trip to the hotel was so easy and leaving the port was so easy compared to arriving in Egypt - this feels weird as you expect someone to ask you for your passport every two minutes. We got the hop on hop off bus in Athens and have it for 2 days so that should be good. We have already done one loop and know exactly where we want to get off and look around tomorrow. We saw one changing of the guard but it appears on Sunday at 11am they have a really spectacular display so going to get there early tomorrow so we can see it.



We joined the hop on hop off bus at Parliament Square which took a bit of working out how to get there from the hotel but we managed it. I negotiated a price as there were 4 of us buying tickets (always the haggler) and we took the route that went past the Acropolis and Parthenon, Temple of Zeus and had another, you guessed it, spot of lunch which was absolutely amazing value and really lovely food. Well it must have got to Eric and Sue as they fell asleep on the bus, ha ha - so had to have a photo opportunity didn’t I. Well we did get the discount on the bus!

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Photos

Santorini
Just as you would expect beautiful

Just stopped for a glass of wine
Not bad a view but my god the prices!!