Athens

We had a lazy morning.  We slept in, had breakfast, then packed.  We took a few last pictures and then headed to the airport for Athens.  The Santorini airport is tiny and filled to the limit with tourists, nothing is on time, but everything works out.  We took a train into Athens and it was about a block and a half walk to the Hilton.  I am not impressed with the room, it is so tiny compared to the awesome rooms we have had so far.  The bathroom is nice and the beds seem really comfy, so there is that.  Our balcony looks at Mount Lycabettus.

We headed out to the Byzantine Museum, then grabbed dinner at a street cafe before finishing the day with the Benaki Museum.  Half of the pictures I took at the museums will mean nothing to me tomorrow, but there is so much history and art here.  The intricate jewelry pieces from ancient times were amazing.   My feet are so swollen from walking, but my blister has healed enough not to hurt, yeah.

Day 2 Santorini

Today we started with a much smaller, but still good breakfast at our hotel after both passing out last night.  We caught a bus to the Akrotiri ruins, which are the remains of several towns built on top of each other then buried by a volcano.  The site is nice and it is all encompassed by a roof that keeps it cooler, but after visiting Pompeii it is not even close. We walked down to the shore from the site and caught a water taxi to Akrotiri's Red Beach, White Beach and finally Black Beach - the beaches get their names from the colors of the cliffs and volcanic sand that literally make the beaches white, red and black (very hot). The boat ride was nice, cheap and offered amazing views.  Sorry, didn't take my tablet to the beaches.  

We caught a bus back to Fira to grab some lunch and hang out by the pool. The hotel owner informed us that she had to change our room, but now we have a villa with a full kitchen and a walk in shower, so I'm not complaining.  We spent the afternoon at the pool, I am sunburned on my neck and chest, still ghostly white everywhere else, ugh.  I also learned that the beautiful Santorini blue that the bottom of the pool was painted with rubs off - I had blue feet, legs and arms from leaning on the sides until I took a shower.  

 Church of Panagia of Platsani

Before sunset we caught a bus to Oia to watch another beautiful sunset.  Oia is a really cute town, full of churches and more art studios and high end stores than Fira.  A few hundred tourists tried to pack onto the ledge at the end of the island to catch the sunset, it was insane.  We wandered around a little before heading back to the hotel.  The streets were still narrow and winding, but smooth stone versus the cobblestone streets of Fira - so much easier on my sore feet.

Street in Oia

We picked up dinner from a local bakery and got amazing pictures of a red moon coming up over a church.  We stopped in to let the hotel staff know when we needed a ride to the airport and ended up hanging out on the patio.  The owner's husband served us his homemade sheep's milk cheese and sweet Santorini dessert wine.  We just had our dinner there and chatted with the family, they were so nice (and the cheese was really good).

First Day in Santorini

Fira, Santorini

I started this post in a hammock by the pool, but the breeze here on Santorini is a little chilly after the moon comes up.  We flew to Santorini today and the hotel had a driver to pick us up, so no worries about getting lost in the tiny, winding streets.  Our room wasn't ready so we went wandering and found a great gyro place, seemed like a Greek version of Chipotle, really good. When we got back our room was ready and it is nice.  Dream Island Hotel is older, but you meet the whole family running it and we have a suite again, score! Most water on the island comes from a desalination plant, so we picked up some bottled water at the owner's suggestion.

View from balcony at Dream Island Hotel

We explored Fira today, checking out old churches and tourist shops.  The picture here is at the top of where the cable car and donkeys offload the passengers from the cruise ships down in the caldera.  It looks like a wild ride to the city either way.  You have to be careful walking around, drivers here are "creative" and anyone can rent a four-wheeler or scooter and join the madness. 

Wine Flight at Santos Winery

Santorini is known for its wines, so we hopped on a bus to the nearest one, Santos Winery.  We had a 12 wine tasting with bread, cheese, olives and local Santorini tomato paste.  It was so good and the view over the caldera and back toward Fira was amazing.  We picked out some gifts and souvenirs, then tried to find our way home.  The bus stop was not marked and we found some others wandering around too.  I was about to try flagging down a car when the bus came by, whew.  We went down by the pool when we got back to the hotel, but moved to the balcony of our room with hot tea as it got chilly.  I definitely have at least one blister that is throbbing, treating it and hoping it improves.

Old Town Rhodes

Today we started with another great breakfast, then caught a painfully overloaded bus into the old town.  Old Town Rhodes is a fortified city directly on the harbor, with the new city growing around it in all directions.  Old Town has ancient temples to Greek gods, small chapels, Medieval remainders of the Knights of Rhodes and mosques from the Ottoman empire.  The small, winding streets are packed with historical sites right next to hotels, cafes and tourist shops.  The old town is surrounded by two walls with a dry moat between that you can walk in.  Huge sandstone cannon balls left from a siege are all over the area and are used for decoration now.  The old town extends out to the bay where the base of the Colossus of Rhodes is all that remains of the ancient wonder.  The best views of the crowded city were from the top of the city walls, but there was no shade and it was so hot today.  I may be a little sunburned now and my feet are feeling the cobblestone streets.  We came back to the hotel to enjoy our last night at the pool and get packed.

Rhodes Harbor

View from Rhodes City Walls

Lindos, Rhodes Island

Sunday went to Lindos for the day, a small town on the Western coast of the island a little over an hour bus ride away.  The town is your typical little Greek Town of white washed buildings, but it also ruins of an ancient Acropolis on a peak above the town and two beautiful beaches.

St Paul's Bay looking up at Acroplis

You can walk straight up to the ruins, or you can ride a donkey.  We chose the donkeys!  It was too funny, but saved our legs the climb.  The Acropolis of Lindos doesn't have much left, but the views make it worth the visit.

Acropolis of Lindos

We walked down the other side of the mountain and wandered into a tiny Byzantine church with a bell tower.  The church looked so simple outside, but the inside was covered in ancient frescoes, some appeared to have gold inlay. There were ornate chandeliers and prayer boxes, but no photos were allowed.  Then we headed for the beach to cool off.

Looking down on St Paul's Bay from Acropolis

St Paul's Bay is said to be one of the places the apostle Paul was shipwrecked during his 3rd mission trip.  There is a tiny commemorative chapel in the cliffs on the beach.  The beach was small, but the water was so nice.  We just floated and bobbed around.  The water was clear enough to see your toes in shoulder high water.  We ate at a small rooftop cafe near the bay then caught the bus back to our hotel.  I'm only a little sunburned, so far...

Arrival in Greece

Atrium Platinum Hotel

After 12 hours in flight and 18 hours total travel time...we made it to Rhodes!  We are staying at this amazing hotel, Atrium Platinum, and somehow we were upgraded to a suite (I have no idea what we will do with the second room, but we now have 2 bathrooms - jacuzzi tub in one and a walk-in shower in the other.).  The view from our balcony is over the pools and out over the ocean.  We went down to the beach to put our feet in the Mediterranean Ocean, then grabbed dinner from a cafe on the beach.  We were jet-lagged and the pool was already closed, so we just sat on our balcony enjoying a glass of wine.  The beds were so nice and I slept great.  The breakfast buffet had almost anything you could think of, even sushi and desserts, but we had a table looking out over the sea.  Vacation is starting off great.

Prague Day 2

Today we overslept and it was worth it, but we almost missed breakfast.  We decided to see the Prague Castle and larger St Nicholas Cathedral today, but plans change....
We asked the concierge for help and managed to tram right to the castle. The castle is actually several castles, cathedrals, gardens, a stable and a convent sprawling over a hilltop above Prague (almost each is now a separate museum or exhibit with its own ticket).  We picked what we felt were the highlights and barely finished before they closed for the day - I think this is pretty normal, because all tickets are good for 2 days.
We started with St Vitus Cathedral, whose large black spires are on almost all postcards of Prague.  The cathedral is huge with ornate stained glass in every alcove.  The outside is Gothic with gargoyles as waterspouts. Next we went through Old Prague Castle.  Fun note - when folks in Prague get mad at leaders, they throw them out a window (there are 27 crosses in Old Town Square commemorating one of these events); however, the guys tossed out of Prague Castle survived! There are replicas of the coronation jewels on display in this castle, the originals are only displayed at special events.
St George's Basilica is a quaint red-orange chapel in the center of the complex.  The interior is small and simple, in a Romanesque style.  You can peer down into a small crypt and there are religious relics (bones) in one of the small chapels.  The white towers of the adjoining convent rise behind the basilica, they house an art gallery now.
The highlight of the day was the Golden Lane.  This is a row of multi colored cottages along a narrow road along the castle's outer perimeter wall.  Some have been turned into gift shops, but some have been restored to ancient times with exhibits of a typical home, seamstress shop, alchemist shop and a pub.  The top of the wall has been covered and there are exhibits of armor and weapons, as well as the original defense notches you can peek out of.  You than walk down into a small exhibit of the dungeon with some tools of the trade.
Last stop on the castle tour was the Treasury of St Vitus Cathedral.  This is a small restored cathedral that now holds many of the precious religious relics, is - lots of gold, jewels and religious relics (bones/teeth of saints, pieces of the cross, a piece of the tablecloth from the last supper, etc).  The jeweled crosses of religious leaders on display were my favorite.  The interior of the cathedral was the most ornately decorated, with murals and gold inlay everywhere, but there was no photography allowed inside, I tried (and a docent that speaks no English can communicate perfectly well when she wants to).
By now, the day was almost over, so we decided to go looking for dinner.  We went back to the tram, but couldn't find a place to buy a ticket - so we asked for help and promptly got lost.  We stopped a few blocks later at a hotel where a very nice concierge sold us tram tickets and gave us directions to the restaurant.  He had a desk made of what looked like an ancient door and a stuffed cat next to his desk - of which he didn't know the history of either - but very nice and helpful man.  We finally found the restaurant, and it was closed for a private party! Really!
We decided to head back to the hotel and managed to make all the right tram transfers - note: just because a tram stops in one spot going north, does not mean it will stop opposite there going south (one block up, down, or around a corner is perfectly normal). By now it was raining and cooling off in a hurry.  I checked trip advisor on my tablet for nearby dinner recommendations and we found one -Home Kitchen.   Home Kitchen is a tiny, 2 bench-style table restaurant that looks directly into the kitchen.  There is a fixed menu daily and we had missed the main dinner dish of grilled pork, mushrooms and potatoes.  I settled on a bowl of mushroom soup and a ham and cheese quiche, it was soooo good.  Jenn had roast beef that was also really good.  I may go back for the bread alone, though, so tasty.