here we have a lot of time for exploring the Greek Islands and relaxing on beaches.

Diana’s comments: So far, I like what I’ve seen of Greece. In Athens, there is a ton of construction going on - guess they are still getting ready for the Olympics next year. I guess Vancouver will be the same in a few years to come. We did all of the tourist sites we could in one day: the Acropolis with the Parthenon at the top, a few odeons/theatres, temple of Zeus, the changing of the guard. Did you know that the Acropolis is on a mountain that looks like solid marble? All of the ancient buildings look like they are made of solid white marble!

Our hotel wasn’t the cleanest, but it had a balcony with a great view of the Acropolis. I’d show you the pictures, but we still have the upload problem.

On the 14th we took a ferry to Naxos - we picked it because it was the first one coming along the day we picked to head out to an island. Of course it was my overwhelming desire to be on a beach on the 15th (my birthday!) that made us pick the first one… Anyways, when we got off the boat, we were bombarded with people trying to get us to rent at their hotel. One man caught our attention and we decided to go with him. I think it was the fact that he used the word “New” in his description of “Seaside Studios”. Plus, it was a good price for us. We made a good choice - this place had a fridge, bathroom with shower, a private balcony with sea view and air conditioning. And everything only one month old. Once we were settled, we sat on our balcony and watched an awesome sunset.

Of course, I got what I asked for on my birthday - beach, sun, swimming and a good book - thank you Richard for getting me there! A good way to bring in the new decade.

It’s been over a week now, and we’re still staying in the same place. Aside from spending many days laid out on the beach, we have rented a scooter and scooted around the whole island. We found the Aria Cave on Mount Zeus, but we had only a tiny flashlight so we didn’t get far. We spent a day walking around Naxos town and went to the Temple of Apollon (or Dionesis?) that only has an arch left, climbed up to the castle and wandered around its maze-like streets. Today we took a day trip to Paros (1hr ferry) and rented a scooter. We found the butterfly valley, but saw only four butterflies since it is the end of the season. After driving past many beaches, we found a great place to jump off a cliff into the sea, but being chickens that we are, we only jumped off the lower rocks (about 8ft).

We have plans to go to Santorini soon, and maybe another daytrip to Delos/Mykanos.

So I just realized we never finished updating this page with the rest of our stay in Greece. So here is the rest:

We went to Santorini for two nights - we found the view and sunsets amazing! We made the trek down the cliffside to the old pier and took a boat trip to the “active” volcano island and hot springs. The volcano was good with its craters and steaming rocks. The hot springs was disappointing since it wasn’t very hot, and it was very mucky. We jumped off the boat into the cold water and swam to the heat, but felt that it was gross so we swam back almost right away. There were no near beaches, so we rented a scooter and drove to one of the black sand beaches (it was pebbles and not sand) and it was very hot on the feet!

We went back to Naxos and to our favorite Seaside Studios where Vaggelis and his sister kept a room waiting for us (thank you!). In the last five days here, we were beach bums every other day. The day trip to Mekonos and Delos was interesting. Delos, which has nothing on it but a large archeological site was interesting to walk around and see the statues and ruins. We didn’t have much time on Mekonos, but we saw the famous windmills and some pelicans wandering around the town. One day in Naxos we also rented a scooter again and took our new big flashlight and explored the Aria cave again.

Thanks to Vaggelis and his whole family (who by the way, gave us so many fresh tomatoes and veggies that we had Greek salads every day), we really enjoyed our stay in Naxos.

Overall, we left Greece feeling rested and relaxed and ready for our next adventures in Egypt