Advertisement
Truth be told, I don’t even know who Anthony Quinn is, but apparently famous round here, has a bay named after him. Something about a movie called Guns of Navarone. Never heard of it. But it’s a fine location for swimming with the posh people, if that’s what you’re into (which we obv are). But more on that later.
The journey to Rhodes had a little more stress than was required. We had originally booked on a 5.00 ferry, allowing a leisurely morning and lunch and shopping in Fethiye. But they rudely cancelled that ferry…something about seaworthiness certification, and put us on the 9.00 one. The rental car place only opened at 8.00 and we were supposed to have checked in to the ferry by 8.30. When the rental car guy still hasn’t turned up at 8.15, tensions ran high, but all was good and we made the ferry no worries.
In true ‘southern European’ fashion, we were late and passport control was chaotic but we found a nice spot for an early lunch and our apartment was ready early so we dragged our bags through the cobbled streets of the old town, with much whinging, before arriving at
our courtyard oasis. Some much needed time in aircon before heading out to explore.
It sounds obvious, but the differences to Turkey could not have been more stark. Even though we were only 1.5 hours away (2 if accounting for Southern European time), it felt like another world! We’d finally found all the tourists everyone had been talking about! Had a lovely time strolling the streets and checking out all the laneways and shops. Oh, and cats. There were some of them too. Eloise noticed.
Geoff had spied a restaurant famous for its kleftiko so we headed there for dinner before retiring for a well deserved rest.
Next day dawned and we enjoyed a relaxing morning before heading to the Palace of the Grand Master - Rhodes was an important location for knights and this was one of their strongholds. When we arrived, there was also an exhibition on the history of 2400 years. Given its strategic position, it’s one of those places that has layers of history and we enjoyed checking out the remnants, particularly the stories of its origin - when the gods were dividing up the world, Helios, the sun god was absent (amateur
hour!!) and missed out, so when Rhodes emerged from the water, Zeus gave it to him (maybe not such a bad result after all?!).
Then went and checked out the actual palace - lots of mosaics and knighty things. Lunch was a much-longed-for gyros, then a walk around the town walls.
Finally hit the shops. Got in the zone and did some good shopping. Girls even joined in for a bit - eloise lasted longer than beeb. After all that retail therapy, needed a cocktail to calm down, so found a rooftop bar and has drinks and snacks before retiring to our courtyard for some cards and dinner.
Busy morning for Geoff as we’d decided to rent a car to solve the bag storage/airport transport issue. He collected it, then us, and headed for the ‘most famous’ beach in Rhodes. Good decision to stay in the old town, but really glad we got to rub shoulders with the beautiful people for a while on the coast…but equally glad to leave after we’d had our swim and frolick. Anthony Quinn knew a beautiful spot when he saw it, but after Beeb announced loudly for the second time that
‘that woman has her boobs out’, it was probably time to leave.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.115s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 16; qc: 34; dbt: 0.0684s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb