Blogs from Greece, Europe - page 499

We were wonderıng how the return to the EU would be. We were expectıng lots of fences and queues and hassle. Surprısıngly ıt was easy and we jumped the car queues and cycled at speed down hıll ınto Greece. The crossıng we choose was not a busy one and the Albanıan sıde even forgot to charge us the 10 euro border tax that the Foreıgn offıce had warned us about. (please excusse the 'ı' - İ am on a turkish keyboard and keep forgetting to hıt 'i') Borders are strange thıngs; I can not really imagıne that just because we pass a lıne on the map that everythıng wıll be dıfferent, but ıt ıs. There are more trees ( Albanıa was partıcularly deforested) and the leaves are startıng to turn- Autumn's comıng! The fırst vıllage ın ... read more

Sun! Blue Sky! Birthplace of Hippocrates!...whaaa? Where have these Levetons got to now? Well, dear friends here is the saga of the path to the Isle of Kos.... We left Vienna as the sky continued to cloud and threaten rain...and decided to seek out a small mountain retreat in the Austrian Alps, favored by Freud for vacations and Eva's friend Sophie. Vienna, Salzburg, Bad Gastein....so easy on Eurailpass...After getting off one station too soon we arrived at Bad Gastein and found ourselves in a truely 'Gimley' hotel, almost deserted.'Gimley' the name of a very dark Canadian director's notion of victorian horror and madness. Everything in town is oriented to massage, radon treatments and purges of unmentionable sorts. The town has a menacing(or thrilling) waterfall crashing through the center of town.... It was almost deserted and other ... read more

When I boarded the overnight ferry headed to Ios, any romantic vision I had had of meeting independent budget travelers from around the world, exchanging stories over tea, and falling asleep with the smell of the Aegean in my hair, quickly was replaced with the harsh reality of a dirty boat crowded with cranky, dirty people. Although cabins are available, most people (and all students) purchase “deck seats.” People literally sleep on every surface of the ship—on all of the floor space and on any available bench, chair, or couch. I did not have a sleeping bag and could only imagine the amount of lice that would crawl in my hair if I slept on the floor, so I stayed awake for the entirety of the 9-hour ride to Ios. (Also, note that it gets very ... read more

So After a terrible bus ride from Corfu to Athens which consisted of 2 ferries and one extremely crazy bus driver, (ie passing cars on really curvy moutain roads) I finally got to Athens. I had been told to get out of Athens as soon as possible but I thought that it was pretty cool. Hung out with some pretty cool Aussies and checked out the acropolis. I thought that it was pretty neat except I thought that I was going to be able to walk around inside the actual parthenon but since they are doing work on it ( and have been since 2000) you can't. All and all I was really impressed with the size and in general how good it looked. After that checked out some more of the sights around Athens, namely ... read more