After Contiki - Leaving Athens / Returning Home

Monday September 18th, 2011. - Leaving Athens.


So this morning was time to say goodbye to Greece, hopefully not forever (I'm not done with you! One day I will have a significant other and we will come back, you mark my words ;) )

But anyways, I won't bore you too much with my details of getting my bags down to the front desk, in those narrow steep stairs, three floors down, nor will I tell you about my anxiety attack at waiting over an hour for my transfer to show up. (In a car, when I had booked a van, and that I had to keep my bags on me, because we were at full capacity.)  It's all part of the adventure, even though it might irritate you at first. It's all in the details and how you look at them.

The trip to the airport was uneventful, checking-in, dropping my suitcase and passing through security was normal as well, except for the extra security and the fact that you couldn't take 10 steps in one direction without someone asking to see your passport. But with all the trouble I had seen in Athens throughout the week, I wasn't that surprised. (Turns out the airport shut down the next day for a few days when everyone went on strike....)

I obviously didn't understand how airports and duty-free worked (I had never been anywhere but within Canada or the States until now.) Because I somehow thought, no need to shop right now, or go get some food at the million restaurants, I'll wait on the other side. Well yeah, DUH. I found myself stranded in a waiting area, looking in at the restaurants and duty-frees. Only a couple vending machines and that one cafe kiosk-thingy on our side. So I missed out on the exciting last-minute shopping. Which was probably a good thing, as I had bought quite a lot already. But I was hungry and didn't like feeling cooped up on such a small space.

And of course the plane was late, kept being delayed and delayed, ended up leaving almost 2 hours later than scheduled. I felt bad for my roommate Rick, who was supposed to pick me up at the airport, but I figured he'd check the schedule and see the arrival time had changed. It's not like I carried my phone with me or anything. (He didn't check departures and arrival times, and showed up an hour before we were scheduled to land, so he ended up waiting over 3 hours for me. Let's say that since then, I have booked my own transport from the airport lol)

Same drill on the flight back, lots and lots to drink, Air Transat and their +++ packages seriously rock, and after that it was back to reality. Sad but true, all good things must come to an end.!

After Contiki - Athens 3

Sunday September 17th, 2011. - Alone in Athens Part 2.


So, today was my last full day in Greece. I had to take the plane back tomorrow morning, and be back at work bright and early on Tuesday morning.

(*Trust me, allow some jet lag time-adjustment if you're not used to it... I now try to book a day in before my return and work...)

So, this morning, I had booked a half-day trip to Cape Sounion (Cap Sùnion) through my Hotel. So I packed a bag, and head out to the square for more walking around before the rendez-vous point, at a different hotel. Of, course, I had to go see the changing of the guards again, it is such a dance. Grabbed an iced coffee, I still say we don't do coffee right around here, and then started the day's adventure.

I wanted to go there, to see the Temple of Poseidon, my main purpose for visiting Greece was to see as many temples and ruins as I possibly could after all. And I was not disappointed, it was magnificent. It took close to 2 hours to get there, they let you loose with some information for about an hour (can't get lost, it's a Temple on top of a hill, surrounded by the Aegean Sea) and then they drive you back.

 

I highly recommend a visit to Sounion, the scenery is breathtaking, it is Beach-a-palooza and the Temple itself is absolutely impressive. The sound of the waves, the sun shining down on you, it is so easy to let your imagination running wild. Myself, I teared up a little, again. What? every time my mind was blown I had to check with myself that I was really here, that it was all real. Dreams do come true when you work hard.

 

 

And the drive back was just as lovely, after I've had a quick cold Mythos on the Patio of the Cafe, and of course bought a few trinkets. The sun was slowly setting over the sea, the pictures were quite awesome. But I was also worried about experiencing this trip through a lens, so I put my camera back in my bag, put on my earphones, sat back and just looked out the window, soaking it all in.

 

Back to the hotel, at the end of the day, sadly, it was time to start packing, for checking out the next morning. But not before I picked up some more gyros down the street. Then, I decided I just couldn't leave beer in the mini-fridge, and that I had to drink it all, while trying to repack my suitcase, and watching movies. I managed it all, even though the last of my night is a bit blurry, but I blame it on the tiredness, not the alcohol ;) Same goes for my suitcase, which was overflowing with stuff, and my carry-on too. Oh well.

 

 

After Contiki - Athens 2

 

Saturday September 16th, 2011. - Alone in Athens.


So, most of my group were gone by now, and I was all alone in that sketchy little Hotel-Motel. Still with the coffee table in front of the door, I slept well, considering I did not feel safe at all. It was so nice not to have to be up at 7am, and not have someone else in the room with me. I slept a little bit in, then had a long shower, ate some of the groceries I had bought the night before, and then decided to get started on my day.

I spoke to the clerk downstairs, seeing what kind of activities they could book on my behalf, and I decided for a half-day trip the next day to Cape Sounion, so I could visit Poseidon's temple. It was about 50 Euros, but included round trip transport, so I figured why not.

For today, I decided to use my tickets for the Hop-On Hop-Off bus to get around town and try to see/visit as much as I possibly could. This system is pretty amazing. I did a full round, listening to the commentary, watching people and studying the map, before even coming up with a plan on where to stop and what to do. It was a really great day. I saw and did pretty much everything I wanted to, and took tons of pictures. I spent about 3 hours at the Athens Archaeological Museum. It was a dream come true. So many statues and so many of them in such good state. It was unbelievable. It seemed to be in a pretty sketchy area though, so the 20 minutes waiting for the bus to come around made me pretty anxious. (This was 2 years ago, when things started to escalate in Greece, so there was a lot of homeless people, beggars and armed people around. Not the most reassuring feeling in the world when you're a solo female traveller...)

I also spent some time by the remains of Zeus and Hera's Temple, which was awesome too. Athens is amazingly easier to navigate than I thought. The Hop-on Hop-Off bus was a blessing and allowed me to have a great day! The only time I regretted not being with a group and just by myself, when when trying to take pictures, I suck at selfies haha! Oh well, the importance thing is the souvenirs, not necessarily my stupid faces in front of stuff ;)

I had made plans for dinner with another girl from Contiki who was still around for one day, but I completely misunderstood, and we ended up not seeing each other. I sorta stood her up at the restaurant. But in my defense, it wasn't on purpose, I really misunderstood the plans and I felt horrible and apologize via Facebook so many times.

I found myself a Gyros place, grabbed a few ones to go, locked myself back into my room, watched TV on my DVD player and had a few drinks and had an early quiet night. A long day out in the sun at 40 something degrees, not something I was used to before this trip, so I was spent.

End of Contiki : Athens 1

Friday September 15th, 2011. Athens.

Today was the "Official" end of this Contiki adventure. We've had to put our luggage outside our rooms last night, so it would get dropped off at the port while we got off. It was very early, as we had to check-out and settle our bills for 7h45. Of course, most of us had a very late/early drunk night, and/or we weren't packed or we had bills to settle, and all that kind of fun stuff.  I like to think I'm organized, so very early, I was finished packing my day bag, I was showered and dressed and I was lining up at reception to get my final bill (although I was smart enough to make final credit card payment last night, we still had to make sure I didn't make any more charges to my room card). All of this was taken care of, I was able to go and enjoy a last bit of breakfast. I also made sure to leave a very generous tip to my "maids" in various currencies and wrote up a nice feedback card as well.

It was far from the usual feast, as the cruise was ending and everyone was getting off and in a record time, they had to start the process all over again. The work these guys put in to turn everything around in a few hours is nothing short of amazing. It was impressive. We did feel a little rushed, as the instructions weren't exactly clear as to where to meet and when. (Contiki vs Official directions.)

We did manage to get off the ship, always missing a few people here and there. Once off, we all had to wait around and try to find our bags, and then after everything was settled and we could try to make our way out to the bus, we realized we had an extra set of suitcases. Someone still wasn't off the ship. So we played the waiting game, and let me tell you, people get very pissy very fast about that. On one side, I can understand since I am very anal about punctuality myself and would vote to leave people behind when they're late. But on the other side, sometimes, just sometimes, there are valid reasons for people to be late, and it doesn't matter which way it goes, name-calling and general rudeness and bitchiness and never acceptable. At least in my book, but apparently, I own a very outdated version that no cares about anymore. (FYI- in this case, it was a valid reason that the person got held up on the ship.)

 It's about 9 am by then and we have 3 options: You take a cab to the airport or wherever your hotel is if you're staying longer or the bus will drop off most of the remaining group at the President's Hotel or lastly, they can drop some of us up downtown, at Syngtama Square. I chose the last option, as I had booked a small room right downtown for my next 3 nights. I made plans with a few girls staying at the President's to meet them back up at 6pm for a farewell dinner.

So I was now on my own with my big/full suitcase downtown Athens, looking for my hotel. I knew it was on the same street as the previous one we were at, but that was about it. So I had only a general idea of where I was going, and we were litterally just dropped off at the corner of the square, no time to say Goodbyes or anything. I noticed there seemed to be some kind of protests going on in the aquare and in front of the parliement, so I tried to stay out of the way. There were a lot of police and army around. Of course, when I got to the hotel, completely exhausted and sweaty, I was told that I wouldn't be able to check-in until after 2pm. It was barely 10am. This was going to be a long day. I sat at a cafe for a while, sipping on an way overpriced iced coffee, and then spent the rest of the day on the roof terrace, nodding off with my book. When I was finally allowed in my room, up on the 3rd floor with with narrow and steep staircases, it was almost 3 pm. I locked the door and put the coffee table in front of it, not sure who that would've stopped if they really wanted in.

I enjoyed a refreshing 2 hours nap and almost cancelled on the farewell dinner, I just wanted to sleep more. But I dragged myself in the shower, got ready and went downstairs to give my key back and tell them I was going out for dinner. It was a very small place, maybe a dozen rooms, with real keys, so whenever you were leaving, you had to leave your key with them. I walked back to the square, feeling a bit nervous with all the  armed "security" people in the street, and I hopped in a cab to get me to the other side of town, to meet with the group.

There were only 6 of us who met and decided to ask for a restaurant near by and walk there to enjoy a last traditionnal dinner, as most of us were leaving tomorrow. The restaurant we were sent to was wonderful. I do wish I remembered the name so I could recommend it to everyone, but sadly I don't. But it was absolutely the best. At first, the staff didn't seem impressed to see us walk in as the place was empty and they were watching some basketball game on TV. But we got a nice table outside and a very nice waiter. We got a huge starter of Tzaziki and bread and a cold beer. After that we switched to the house white which was very good and I had some seafood pasta, and it was delicious. Mid-meal, the waiter brought us another pitcher of wine, on the house!!! And when we were done eating and just chatting away, he brought over for each of us a piece of baklava, again on the house. Wow, who were we to say no to baklava? And it was one of the best I have had. And even after all that, he came back with 7 shots of Ouzo, again on the house, so we could have a cheer with him.

Well, after 2 weeks in Greece, I had been very proud that I stayed clear of Ouzo, not wanting to suffer the consequences, but it would have been rude to refuse. So we clinked and drank. My that was horrible. Like drinking gasoline. It went straight to my head and I felt instantly drunk. Seperating the bill was fun, as we are all generous tipper, we always seemed to end up with as much tip as the main bill. It took a long time to figure that one out lol But so much fun was had!!! We then walked to the supermarket close by to buy bottled water and I also decided I should buy snacks and beer and diet-pepsi. It was too much to carry on a normal day, so imagine when drunk-ish. I saw the rest of the group back to the hotel and then took another cab back to mine. I watched TV for a bit but I was glad to finally go to bed and get to sleep in tomorrow. I had nothing planned but to take the hop-on hop-off bus to get to the sights I hadn't been yet.

Contiki 12 - Med Cruise 7.

Contiki Day 12: Med Cruise 7, Crete, Thursday September 15th, 2011.

So, technically, today is the last day of the cruise, as we have to get off tomorrow morning at like 630 am. We are in Crete, Knossos, where we can tour the famous Palace, where King Mynas and the myth of the Minotaur took place. Most of us declined the guided tour, as it was more of a city tour than anything. Lewis and I decided to go to the Palace on our own. Lewis had decided to fly back to Santorini, he had friends staying there for a few days and he wanted to join. It was a good idea, as the cruise was over and Santorini was definitively worth more time than just a rushed day.

So, we met up at 10, a bit of sleeping in was appreciated and Lewis needed to pack and whatnot. So we walked outside, around the town a little bit and then I got myself a very much needed caffeine Starbucks - Whipped Cream fix -Yummy! Then I went with Lewis to buy his plane ticket and then we grabbed  a cab to Knossos Palace. It was a bit sketchy, as we actually had to bargain a price with the guy, who was trying to get us to pay an outrageous price to wait for us while we were there and then take us back. No! We got a decent price just for a one way, finally. It was very far and took a while, and the area wasn't nice at all. I wasn't impressed so far, because I knew Crete was a beautiful place, and we only got to see the poor neighborhood. How glad I was not to be alone.

The site was actually very very beautiful. I know I keep going on and on about the views, but honestly, it was breathtaking. You can so understand why a big palace would be sitting right there. It's all about the location :) There was a tour of French people walking around at the same time we were there, so I was listening in and translating some of the facts to Lewis. Of course, being a mythology maniac myself, I already knew a lot. It was a very fun, relaxing day.

Taking a lot of different pictures  with Lewis, just walking around slowly, taking it all in. I was a bit disappointed that half the site was closed off and that there was no "real" labyrinth. Seems like it was even more of a Myth than I though of. But there was a lot of wall paintings with bulls, all colorful and impressive. And there was a roped off area that to me, looked like it could have been part of the maze, so I decided it was. Whatever, it made me happy lol.

After we were done, maybe like 2 hours later, we walked across the street to the souvenir shops. I love those. I bought plenty of stuff, met a nice vendor who was all excited I was from Canada, showed me his collection of money and a picture of him with our Premier Stephen Harper, when he was here vacationing a few years back. It was kinda funny.

Now we had to go back and try to get a cab back to the port. Sounds easier than it was. All the cabs were reserved for returning people. It was a real pain in the ass to get someone to call the company and get us a cab. We had to wait forever too. We finally got one, who tried to bargain a price, again. And then he took us on a very scary ride. His driving was insane, and he was taking through back streets and very very bad neighborhoods, and he took the long way. Honestly, I was very scared by the end of it. I wasn't sure he was actually taking us back, I thought we were going to get robbed.

But we made it back, and I had to say goodbye to Lewis, who had to leave soon. I decided to go back to town and walk around all the shops again. Bought more stuff, then came back to the ship for Tea time. Tea hour was the best, they'd set up this amazing buffet of small sandwiches and pastries, it was so delicious. Lounged for a bit by the pool, started packing my stuff, just relaxed.

We had another meeting, where we all sat around, took millions of pictures, exchanged email addresses, got our passport back and instructions for the next morning. We had to have our suitcases out of our rooms that night, so we needed to pack an overnight bag. Tricky, but it made sure our bags would be out by the time we were. We were getting a ride back to either the President Hotel in Athens, or Syngtama Square downtown.

We all went to dinner together, one last fancy event with lots to drink and then ended the night at the disco. Nothing special, but it was a tad more emotional, and pretty much everyone showed up. One last Contiki party :)

Contiki 11- Med Cruise 6.

Contiki Day 11: Med Cruise 6, Santorini, Wednesday September 14th, 2011.

Today is going to be a big day. Santorini. I was so looking forward to this island. I was up very very early, walking on the deck and taking pictures. I know vacation is usually a time to relax and sleep in, but not for me. I sleep-in every weekend I'm not working. Hell, I paid 3k to be on this trip, I was going to enjoy every minute of it. I guess that philosophy probably caught up with me, as I was very tired and a bit moody that morning.

We were getting off at 8am, and we had to line up and take those little boat shuttles to bring us to the island. It was pretty great to sit on top of this boat and watch the scenery for 10-15 min. (Although it did take forever until we finally got to go.) We have to take a bus and go take a tour of the Island, and a visit to the Village of Oia. It was included with our Contiki Tour. I'm not going to go on and on and on about the scenery's, it was breathtaking, yes, but you've all seen pictures before, the tall volcanic island with all the white houses with the blue domes. It's featured in every movie and on every postcard. This village has a lot of movies filmed there too, think the Sisterhood of the Travelling pants, the scene with the donkeys :)

This spot was just marvelous, it was a picture-perfect moment everywhere we turned. We were given some time to walk around this enchanting city and do some shopping after the tour. I am not quite sure what I did wrong this morning, I was a bit moody, but I was basically told I should spend the day alone by the girls I usually hung out with. I felt like I was in High School again. We had time in this village, then we were being driven back to the top of the Island, different village and we had the rest of the day off. Most of the group wanted to take a cruise in a pirate boat later on, and go see some volcanic rocks from up-close. I really wanted to do this, the other girls didn't want to, and I might have said something wrong, I really don't know. Oh well, it stung, but it wasn't the end of the world. And it was so beautiful and peaceful, I wasn't going to let it ruin my day. I walked around with other people, bought a lot of souvenirs, paintings included and discovered my favorite snack ever, peanuts covered in honey and then sesame seeds. Oh it was so good!

So, after that, we were left at the other village, Thira, where we had 3 choices, take the Cable Car down (We had a free ticket) or walk down, about an hour-long walk in stairs (with my foot? No Thank you!) or take the donkey ride for a few euros. Well, I absolutely wanted to take the donkey ride, but going up, no way I had the balls doing that going down. The Cable Car was going to be scary enough as it is. (And it so was.) It was shortly before Lunch and I decided to go back to the ship and grab some buffet there, before coming back and doing the Pirate thing. I broke off from the rest of the group, everyone was pretty much going their own way anyways. The Cable Car was absolutely terrifying, especially when you don't like heights, but it was a once in a lifetime thing, and it was beautiful. I couldn't take enough pictures of the view.

Grabbed some food on the ship, then found out the shuttle boats were not running for 2 hours, Lunch break so I took a nap in my room; I was feeling sorry for myself at that point and I wanted to shake out of my funk. Because of this, I completely missed out on the Pirate Ship cruise, so that was disappointing. So I finally went back after my nap and my shower, took the boat back and then decided to try the Donkey ride on top of the island. Well, it would have been great to have people I knew with me, I could have had my picture taken on the donkey. There was only a couple with me. It was a fantastically hilarious experience! I laughed so much, I got scared, I got hurt, it was awesome! It's one hell of an experience. My donkey was crazy, he wanted to be the first in line so he was running up and cutting other donkeys off and hugging the walls. (I have videos.) I wasn't really able to take good pictures, as you have to be using both hands to hold yourself steady, but still, best time ever, even by myself. After that, I spent a long time shopping around and ended up sitting at a table by the view and I watched the sunset with a nice glass of wine and a very yummy gyros. Aaaaah.

Went back to the ship on one of the last shuttles and then I had to change, we had a Contiki Cocktail Party/Hour scheduled at the Disco. They opened early for us, since we missed the captain's Cocktail yesterday, we wanted something special. It didn't turn out so great. I won't go into too much details, but a lot of the group was on "rowdy" and rude behavior, throwing peanuts around and being very demanding to the staff, who were doing us a favor after all. But the drinks went down very fast and then we went straight to dinner as a group, using 3 big tables. lot of wine was consumed again, and a very late night was had by most of us. I went to see the last showing of the Mama Mia presentation by the crew, and it was very fun!!!

Of course, I had to make a fool of myself at Karaoke at the Disco after that ;) Nah, I wasn't so bad, I love singing. It was a nice icebreaker I guess, as I got the whole thing going! Ended the night at the Sports Bar and Casino, as per usual and that was it. Another very nice day with Contiki :)

Contiki Day 10: Med Cruise 5 (Part 2.)

Contiki Day 10: Med Cruise 5, Patmos (AM) and Kusadasi (PM) Tuesday September 13th, 2011.

Part 2. Kusadasi, The House of Virgin Mary and The Ephesus.

So, after a nice shower and a change of clothes, I headed back to the poolside for some buffet lunch (I did not have the patience to wait for the special) and a nice iced coffee. I was way too excited to stand still for too long. A few hours later, it was time to meet again for the arrival at Kusadasi. (We had boarded back this morning at 1030 and we were getting off at 230pm.)

There had been 2 different tours offered to us, The Ephesus and the House of the Virgin Mary and The Ephesus. There wasn't a big time difference to have both, and it was 3 or 5 euros more to do the combined tour. I'm not a very religious person, but I figured that for the price, I'd go. I was very surprised to see that quite a few people skipped the tour entirely (OK it was all optionals, as you had to pay extra, but, wow.) and even the ones that did go, picked The Ephesus on it's own. There was only a few of us on the combined tour again. But it was OK, we were once again mixed with the people from, the morning. We hopped on a bus, picked a nice guide up and went on our way the the House of the Virgin Mary. Of course, it was sitting at the top of a mountain, with a breathtaking view.

At first, I wasn't really touched by the story (That John the Baptist and the Virgin Mary had come here into hiding) but then I saw a lot of emotional people and it kinda got to me. Once again, we had to line up, in silence, this was Holy Ground, cannot talk inside the House, no pictures. Lots of people crying, I got caught up in the moment and teared up a little too. I bought, well put money in a wooden box, to take a candle, which I brought outside where they had a beautiful display with a lot of candles all lit up, for prayers and loved ones. That's where I cried a tiny bit, when I lit my candle and took a picture of it. (It was for both my Grandmas, my Grandpa and my aunt.) I also ended up buying a few Virgin Mary medallions. I was very glad I chose to go, it ended up being a very lovely moment.

Next stop, The Ephesus! I was SO excited! I'm pretty sure I annoyed a lot of people on the way over, but I honestly didn't care. For over 10 years I had wanted to go to this site, I was going to enjoy every second of it. *Now, it was a very amazing visit, although the site is way too massive to get to see everything in such a short time, so we missed on a lot of stuff. Especially MY favorite, the only standing column from the Temple of Artemis. We didn't go there and it was really sad.*

For one of the first times ever, I barely paid any attention to the guide. From what I overheard, he was very interesting, but I wanted to see everything and walk everywhere, I didn't have time to stand around, listening. It just made it perfect for Lewis and I to take a million pictures back and forth. It was great! We would run all over, look it everything, pose, click then switch places and cameras and then it all over again. I was so giddy. And we were so lucky, we were experiencing something that almost never happens; a near sandstorm. The wind was so crazy, it was impossible to keep your hat on. So it felt like it wasn't quite 42 degrees out!

There was so much to see and take in. Lots of the original structures were still there, and even everywhere on the ground, the rocks, you could find treasures. It was very slippery to walk down the slopes, with the original "roads" rocks and marbles. As clumsy as I am, I had to be careful. Thankfully, my foot barely hurt anymore, so I took the opportunity to go back and forth everywhere. There were stray cats everywhere. You could hear them meow, it was a bit sad. I wanted to feed them all, and give them water and pet them. I got to pet a few kitties, they were so used to people they were very friendly. I even gave some water to one of them, from a nook in a big rock.

Soon after that we started seeing the big library in the background and better preserved structures. It is really, really something to be standing next to and touching stone buildings that have been there for close to 3,000 years. And that library was absolutely huge. It was so incredible to be standing there and getting all this history. I will never ever forget that day. And I had such a good time with Lewis, exploring everywhere and coming up with pictures ideas.

After the Library, I walked by myself a bit further up, and sat on the side of what looked like a main street and on each side used to be hundreds of pillars/columns. Not much was left, of course, but I just sat there, under the sun, imagining what it was like back then. I didn't even realize I had tears running down my face. I just felt like I was home, I was feeling so privileged to be there.

Eventually, the visit was over, way quicker than I expected, we slowly went back to the bus, stopping at all the shops on the way. The vendors were very aggressive and intimidating. We were given a short time to shop. I took advantage of it, as I wanted a lot of souvenirs. I was now an expert at haggling, so I got a lot of stuff for way cheaper than the asking price. Then we went back to town, close to port where a lot of my Contiki group had met to go to a Turkish bath. Now, I understand that this is a really awesome experience, very relaxing and whatnot, but it's not something I'd be comfortable doing. I can barely tolerate a massage, don't like saunas, so I knew this wasn't for me. I walked around the shops with a few girls instead, getting some more souvenirs, as this was our last stop in Turkey.

Back to the ship at close to 8pm, we realized we were missing on the Captain's Cocktail. I had been originally interested in attending, wearing a fancy dress and all, but there just wasn't enough time. I was so dusty, all I wanted was a shower. Most of us still decided to wear fancy clothes and go to the last seating at the restaurant. Lots of wine, lots of fun, lots of stories. It was another great night. And as usual, went to to disco for a bit, had a few drinks, then back to the Sports Bar, more drinks and some casino. My regular little vacation routine, it rocked.

Next stop, Santorini!