Stupendous Man

Mikonos / Santorini

The next morning we had a very early flight to Mikonos. A very early flight meant we would again reach our hotel well before the check-in time. I was mentally prepared for another Attalos like experience already. Since Anu was traveling to India from Greece, we had a truck load of luggage with us. We were flying by Aegean airlines to Mykonos (or Mikonos, they are the same). To my surprise, we were not asked to pay for the extra baggage we were carrying, and we had a lot more than the allowed 15Kgs per person. We found out rather quickly why – the plane was almost empty Our flight was delayed by an hour due to fog and and cloud cover at Mikonos. The flight was a quick trip at less than 45 mins; Barely had we eaten our cookie that we were going to land.

Mikonos belongs the cycadellic group of Islands in the aegean sea. These islands have some common characteristics, the most common of which is the the blue-white architecture of buildings. The other Islands in this belt are Ios, Naxos, Paros, Santorini and few others that I don’t the names too. All of these islands have the common theme of whitewashed walls and mostly blue doors. It makes for a very very picturesque effect, that much we can tell you.

Mikonos is widely regarded as one of the party centrals in Europe, and perhaps even the world. The place is WILD. If you are over 23, you are very likely too old for the place. Its filled with teenagers and college goers on a holiday. Mikonos is also one of the most popular gay destination it seems. At peak summer time, the gay population easily overpowers straight couple population. But don’t let that make you think its not for families or for straight couples. The best part of Mikonos is everybody can enjoy it. We didn’t really care for gay couples or had any issues with them. We were glad that there was at least one place where they could roam around together without the fear of society and name calling on them.

Anyways, as expected we reached our hotel way too early. This was the cheapest hotel we stayed in our entire greece trip, and we have to say the BEST as well. The moment we entered the place we knew we had made a good choice. It was impeccably clean, the architecture was pleasing and the owners were awesome to talk to. They kept our luggage and told us that though our room was not ready, we could have breakfast and venture out for a walk. If our room was ready we could have it quick. We declined the breakfast and went on a morning tour of Mikonos.

Our hotel was on a very steep hill, which was the only downside of the hotel. It was painful every day to climb the hill to get to hotel. But the views of the town and sunset compensated for it.

As it turned out, going out for a early morning walk in Mikonos was actually very useful as its quiet and peaceful. The parties would have just ended and people will have retired to sleep. This is the best time you can roam around the beautiful Mikonos town.

When it comes to tourist attractions, Mikonos doesnt have a whole lot of them. The standard attractions included the windmills, little venice, the beaches of Mikonos and Delos, the birth place of god Apollo, which is also an island around 30 mins away from Mikonos. Needless to say we did all of them, and our agenda for the stay was relaxation so we were not putting that much effort into roaming either

The Mikonos Windmills are a famous tourist spot because of well the venetian windmills. For us desis, its famous because mr. Shahrukh Kahan made them famous. The moment we came back to hotel, my other half quickly determined that this was the place where Khan shot the song “tauba” from chalthe chalthe. Yes, Mikonos was the place the song was shot. The windmills get crowded towards sunset, and we can tell you that its quite magical during that time.

Exactly opposite to windmills is the other major attraction – Little Venice. As the name suggests, this area was built by venetians on water. Hence the name little venice. I am sure it is no comparison to the real venice, but eh, we can claim we saw little parts of it hehe. The area is full of restaurants that get crowded towards evening as sunset approaches.

For the first day, we didn’t do much as we wanted to take it easy. We roamed around a bit, then came to our hotel and had a great afternoon nap, before heading out to the same areas to catch some great sunset pictures.

Needless to say, we spent all our sunsets at this place

Mikonos is known for its beaches. Some of them are super party centrals, while some of them are quieter oriented. The first beach we went was the “Paradise beach”. This is THE party beach of all. There is trance music and party going on pretty much 24/7 on this beach. Loud music, people dancing, beach party are all keywords of this place. A visit to this place ensues that you also get into the mood and swing of the place. We absolutely loved the time we spent there. Do be aware that pretty much most of the beaches in Greece are clothing optional, and even the ones are not, are still top-clothing optional for women. So, be aware!

The Mikonos town at night gives a completely different picture than morning. The streets are full of people, lots of activity going on, and a lot of mom and pop stores trying to entice customers. Not to mention a lot of street restaurants too! I absolutely loved the lively feel and vibe of Mikonos town and would have spent the night roaming around there

We also did the Psouru beach next day where relaxed the whole afternoon. Yes, the water is that clear and green. Beaches in Mikonos tend to be different; not only is the water calm, but as you notice there are no waves either. It is simply peaceful and quiet! Not to mention the clarity of water. The water is stunning clear, and they say the visibility is easily around 80 to 100 feet at many places. We can tell you it is one beautiful clear sea . Needless to mention we loved it. Apparently a lot of celebrities are sighted on this beach; well on this day, we were the celebrities har har!

We also did the half day trip to Delos island which is again full of ruins. Though we had ruin fatigue at this point, we did go and see a lot of ruins. Delos is the birth place of god Apollo, whose sanctuary or temple is at Delphi, where the Oracle delivered their prophecies. It was an interesting completion to circle of sorts. Delos at point in time was heavily populated and was one of the most important ports. It was rich, and money flowed here.

Of course, we came back early from the ruins to catch a boat back. We were tired from ruin watching and though reading the history of it was a lot of fun, we were clearly exhausted. That said, this is a very good site to go though and serves as an excellent half day trip from Mikonos to Delos.

Evening we came back to Mikonos to get some more awesome sunset views and pictures.

After watching some stunning sunsets, we retired back to our room. We had already stayed our part at Mikonos, and were getting to the last leg of our long trip: Santorini. We had no idea about the drama that was about to ensue.

Santorini
We were going to take the morning ferry to Santorini. Unfortunately the hotel taxi had broken down, hence we had to take a taxi cab to the port. This is where the fun started. By mistake we forgot taking our camera from the taxi and he drove away. We realized it good 10 minutes later that our camera was not with us. This left me very disturbed; my camera and not to mention the very expensive lens that I had rented was all gone and I lost hope of getting it back.

I had no money left on my sim card either so I was not able to call anywhere. I asked somebody in the shop to lend me their phone so I could call the hotel. The shop guy obliged. This is where I was super impressed with our hotel and the staff there. They told me that would call up the taxi guys and find out about the camera. They sure did – they also assured me that the camera was safe and the taxi guy was going to bring it back to the hotel. And they asked us to go ahead to Santorini in the ferry and asked for our hotel details. They assured us that they would ship the camera to the hotel without any issues. Which they did, very promptly wrapped in a shorts we had forgotten back in the hotel. I was absolutely thrilled at so many counts – the service by hotel, the honesty of the taxi driver and the overall niceness of the people at Mikonos. Hats off to them.

Though that did mean that I was without my camera for the first two days at Santorini, it was ok to be assured that it was safe. Unfortunately we did the best parts of Santorini in the first two days itself, so a lot of pictures that should have been are not there.

Santorini is widely regarded as THE tourist island on Greece. Not to mention its famous for its Sunsets from the oia village. Santorini as an island is definitely very unique in nature and definitely worth visiting once. However we spent four days in Santorini, which by our standards was way too much. Not to mention that we were not exactly thrilled by our hotel selection either. It was good, but not as good as the money we paid for it. We had discovered very early that Santorini is very very expensive and everything there is at least twice as expensive as it is on other islands.

What makes Santorini is the unique nature of these villages. These villages are perched on clifftops as you can see and are right at the edge. So you are basically at any given time at least 500 – 1000 feet above water. It does create an interest view point. Santorini as an island is huge and nearly circular in nature. Fira, Imerovigli and Oia are its most famous villages. Apparently some thousands of years ago, Santorini was a volcanic island that erupted. Due to the eruption, the central part of a nearly circular island collapsed and went uders sea. Hence, what remained was Santorini with cliffs on one side and beaches on the other side. You can also see the dormant Caldera volcano too from Santorini.

We stayed in the Oia village in Santorini, which for young people like us was not the right choice. The place is quiet and goes ultra quiet by night. Though that said the restaurants in Oia are fabulous. We stayed at the extreme end of Oia, that allowed us to view sunset without any obstruction. Our hotel probably had the best view of sunset, and though the sunsets were awesome, we thought they were overhyped. For some reason Oia sunsets are so famous that people actually clap at Sun’s performance! Its weird! But nonetheless, it was a big photo opportunity.

During our stay, on the day we didnt have our camera, the owner of our hotel gave us a free 1 day personalized ride of the entire island. We can’t tell you how good this man was, and how much of Santorini he showed us in one day. Unfortunately we could not capture any of it in pictures. The owner took us to all important parts of Santorini, the ancient thera, the monastry atop the hill, the red sand beach, the black send beach, the perivolas areas known for its long black sand beaches and more. He left us at beaches to enjoy for a while and would then pick us up. The rock formations around the red sand beach are spectacular and amazing. And the rock formation near black sand beaches are even more awesome to look at. We hiked a bit looking at the porous rocks and the way they had formed near the sea. It was an interesting geological expedition. The owner definitely made up the quality of our stay by this trip.

One of the key things to do in Oia or Santorini is well, watching sunset. And we did that all the days we were there. The last two days of our trip resulted in good sunsets and the the village does look very pretty during that hour. We also spent time at Fira and Imerovigli during our stay.

On the second last day of our trip, we did the volcano, hot springs and sunset tour via a traditional boat with around 30 odd people. It was a half day tour, and except for the sunset part of it, this trip was not worth it at all.

The first part of our trip was a 2 hour hike into the volcano and crater. This was painful and totally un-enjoyable. There was hardly anything to see and exclaim about dormant craters and volcano. We pretty much knew the history of the island, hence going through it again through the guide bored us. We couldn’t wait to get back to our boat. The only exciting thing about the tour was being very close to sulphur gas that emits at places. Still, nothing dramatic or exciting as it is on Big Island.

The next stop of our tour was at the hot springs; apparently the hot springs have some medicinal properties. Because it was a big boat, it didn’t dock close enough. When i first jumped in the ocean, I thought the hot springs were near. When I started swimming I realized how far it was. And when I reached the hot springs, well it was anything but hot! So i turned back and waded towards our boat again. The water was green with sulphur in it, and god only knows how much good it did to my body!

After this stop, the boat then lazily waded the waters until it was sunset. There was food on the boat which was good, and there was also a saxophone player on the boat who was playing english hits of the yore. Luckily this day saw a great sunset. We still felt at end of the night that we probably had spent a day too many at Santorini and perhaps 2 or 3 days was the ideal time to be there.

This night also marked our last night of our long holiday. The next day we took a long ferry ride (9 hours) back to Athens, then spent another 8 hours at airport for the flight to London. At London, I waited another 5 hours for my flight back to SFO, and Anu waited another 10 hours for her flight to Mumbai. Needless to say were completely exhausted by the time we had reached our respective destination.

Overall, both of us enjoyed Greece and though it is an AMAZING country with amazing sights and people. We thoroughly enjoyed whatever the country gave us and yes, we didn’t like a little of it, but eh, what’s life without a little of that? Greeks are awesome people, and their hospitality is incredible. Unlike stories about french or italians that we’ve heard, greeks have no ego issues when talking to you. They are super helpful and will go out of their way to make you happy! As the first european country to visit, Greece was absolutely the best choice for us. We can’t wait to go there again and finish up Rhodes, Crete and Corfu islands. Though that trip will only happen when we finish traveling other places!

Overall, two thumbs way up for Greece!

P.S: I am writing yet another part covering the logistics and bookings that we did during our stay at Greece so as to help potential travelers to Greece.