Greek Islands

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There are 6000 + islands and less than 450 inhabited. We visited three. Mykonos,Santorini and Samos. The water of these islands are crystal clear. A little like the Caribbean. But the beaches are not as welcoming. There are very gritty with small pebbles and not a lot of sand. I could not see anyone laying on a towel on these beaches but many places have beach chairs and umbrellas (for a fee of course) but I think you would need it. Santorini is an island section of a volcanic caldera that has been a covered by the sea. There are two other smaller islands also part of the same caldera (if you don't know what a caldera is then google it!). One of the islands is still an active volcano and is expected to erupt in the next 15 or so years. The main town / village on Santorini is Fira. The town is busy, the streets are narrow, built on a ridge so some streets are steep. There are no beaches here to speak of, but there is a cable car ride from the top down (and back) to the water and the old port area. You can ride a donkey up or down too. Both are 5€ pp each way. We chose to go down by cable car and back by donkey. I was placed on an alpha donkey who took exception to another alpha donkey in the group, resulting in the two of them biting each other, ramming into each other and racing each other up the stairs. I went from exhilaration to total fear and back again about 4 times - it was fun if I wasn't so scared half the time. Oia (pronounced ear) is in the northern end of the island. It is here where you can see the buildings you would associate mostly with Santorini. This is also the place you would see the sunset, which is quite spectacular. The island is quite lovely and I can see how Europeans would say this is an amazing place to holiday - but I would think that they have not yet seen Australian beaches. Not that I am biased of course but our sandy beaches are much nicer to lay on. I suppose the clear waters of Santorini is nicer to swim in than our oceans, but of course you won't need a surf board either.Mykonos, although located in the same island group Cyclades, is quite different from Santorini. Mykonos has very little rainfall and you can see in the landscape the evidence of the dryness. The buildings on this island are all pretty much the same style and all white. It is blindingly white in fact. Also we saw only one bit of graffiti on the entire island. Not sure why. Perhaps because everything is white any colour stands out and is quickly cleaned up. Anyway it is refreshing to see graffiti can be controlled in some places. Mykonos town is the main centre and is full of coffee shops and eateries as expected. There is some lovely jewellery made and sold on the island. I wasn't able to resist of course. <br style="color:� font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal;" />The island has had no rain all year. It is very dry and hot. Of course the people are lovely, helpful and very friendly. The hotel we were in was on a hill and the views were spectacular.The third island Samos is quite different. We left Mykonos at 915pm and arrived at 3.30am on a high speed catamaran. We checked into the hotel and got to sleep about 4.30 am. We had to check out by midday. When we woke up it was raining. We had all afternoon to see what we could of the island as we had to be on a ferry by 5pm to travel to Turkey. Samos is green, clean and very picturesque. Was really impressed by this little village. Would have liked more time here.

Off to Turkey on a little (passenger only) ferry. It took 90 minutes, it was raining and the only seats left were outside in the wind and rain. The trip was uncomfortable and given we had only a few hours sleep tempers were a little on edge. Arriving in Turkey meant passports and visas etc. just as well it was a very smooth process, I think by this time I would have hit someone over the head if it had been difficult.

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Photos

Sunset at Santorini
Just off the island of Santorini, the sunset is quite spectacular

View from the top of the Volcano
Made it to the top of the Volcano on Nea Kameni - this is still a potentially reputable volcano - they say it may erupt again in the next 15 years or so. As long as it was not 15 minutes I was keen to go to the top. What a lovely view of Oia.

Oia
Streets of Oia are narrow and very busy with tourists. Lovely shops too

Oia on Santorini
The village of Oia on Santorini is quite picturesque

Santorini - Old Port
Caught a cable car down to this little spot then a donkey up - what a wild ride that donkey was

Mykonos
Lovely view across the water to the town of Mykonos

Windmills
Here are the windmills to be found on Mykonos. Not sure of the function as they were not turning????

Beautiful Samos
Not long enough here - enough to know I would come back here to really explore!