Got a bit of downtime and since we’re planning our next Holy Week Trip to another awesome destination… would like to share with you some snippets and quick tips from our 2019 Travel to the beautiful white and blue country, Greece!
Where to begin? Food!
If you’re a fan of sliced meat, cheese and fresh vegetables, Greece is your food haven. We had unlimited feta cheese for breakfast, lunch and dinner as food always comes with a serving of bread, roasted tomatoes drizzled in olive oil.
The country is 80% olive trees, you’ll see these trees and olive products almost everywhere. Olive soap? shampoo? they’ve got it! Going back to food, we had mostly Greek food as part of the tour package… being a first timer in Greece can be daunting, considering that my father was a victim of theft in one of their big outlets 😦 Traveling with a group, would be a good idea.
Food is always plenty, but for a Filipino-Chinese group like ours, its not easy to find a Chinese restaurant in Greece and I would recommend you try their local food as they are plenty.
Next Topic, would be the Greek Islands! A local guide will be very thorough with explaining the islands, there are a lot and we were lucky enough to explore 2 popular islands, Mykonos and Santorini apart from the mainland where Athens is located.
Athens is mostly ruins of Ancient Greece. If you’re the type who likes to learn about architecture, look as ruins, traveling throughout the mainland is for you. The nearest and the most preserved structure/ ruin for me is the closest to Athens. You can see the Acropolis of Athens which houses Parthenon anywhere in the city of Athens as it sits on top of a hill. Other ruins can be reached by bus, we took 3 hours to reach the Temple of Apollo and although the view was nice, it would take a bit more imagination to appreciate the ruins. There will be museum close by that illustrates what the original structure used to be and the different explanations about the structural design and a nice collection of artifacts from the site.
From Athens, we took a ferry boat to the “Islands” and it was our first time to travel by ferry that took around 3 hours to Mykonos and another 2 hours to Santorini. It was rough throughout and I wouldn’t recommend ferry-travel to those who gets motion-sickness. The waves were really rough and people where literally throwing up during the 1st part of the trip. We took a smaller ferry because it’s faster considering the distance and you will really feel the waves throwing the boat up in the air and splashing down. Some people got scared and swore never to take the ferry again. It was that bad.
We landed in Mykonos and we’re glad that we lined up early so our luggage were kept inside and not soaked in water. Because of our rough trip to Mykonos, our trip was cut short to 30 mins. Our next ferry boat will leave in 2 hours and we had super short time to go around. Mykonos was beautiful, it’s a small town with a great view and I it’s a lot livelier during summer time. When we visited last April, most of the stores were closed, and most of the establishment were still renovating and repainting, I guess they’re preparing for the peak season.
Traveling to Santorini was the highlight of the trip, and from Mykonos, we took the bigger ferry boat. You wouldn’t feel the waves a much but mind you, checking-into the ferry was apocalyptic. Imagine this, you’re all lined up with your luggage, and as soon as the boat docked, you have to literally RUN and scramble for a space for your luggage… I have no words. There were no tagging whatsoever and it’s highly likely that you’ll loose your luggage if you don’t secure it. You’re with 500+ other tourist, all scrambling for a space while trying to go up the seating deck as fast as you can. The ride was a bit smoother and the seats were wider and you can easily get out of the viewing deck to get some fresh air while enjoying the view of the islands.
The bigger boat will take you to other small islands and different stops along the Aegean Sea before you reach Santorini and took us around 2 hours.
Upon reaching Santorini, we were checked in at a resort at the other end of the island, Thira town. Given that the popular spots like Oia were expensive, Thira was an affordable place to stay. We were checked in at El Greco Resort & Spa. It was comfortable, with really nice pockets of lounge areas. To get to the Thira, where the market and shops are, we had to walk 15 mins, the view was nice so I wouldn’t mind walking. Generally the shops in Thira were more reasonably priced that in Oia. Both towns have generally the same items and shop brands. What we like about shopping in Greece is that the shops are run by artisans. Artisans and Jewelers of the 2nd and 3rd generation would be there to greet the customers and explain their work. They are greatly inspired by what they see in the island and since the place is a tourist spot, they are able to produce items that tourist and locals would like to buy.
From Thira, it took us 30 mins to reach the other end of the island to Oia town. It’s where the famous movie scenes are filmed and it really has a very beautiful view of everywhere. Shops aligned the cobbled roads and you really have to be considerate with the locals there as tourists can be obtrusive with posing and sometimes going inside their property. For first time travelers, I suggest you take your time to go around, take photos, look at the products and enjoy the view. It really is something and people there are warm, friendly and inviting. Tip, our tourmate found this bookstore called the Atlantis and sells story books that can be mailed. Nice to be different from the usual postcard 🙂
If you have money to spare, it’s also nice to buy a piece of jewelry here, they’re legit and I still wear mine today with no tarnishing whatsoever.
Shopping guide – you can always haggle, but if they say it’s fixed price, especially those with barcodes, don’t haggle anymore 🙂 The sellers are normally very nice, they really are proud of the products they sell and tourism is really what keeps them alive during their economic crisis. I bought items with the evil eye and olive products, they are usually cheap for the quality, around 1 to 2 Euros. If buying items of value, as for tax refund which will be credited to you when you get back to Manila. It’s Legit!
Final thoughts, except for our horrible experience shopping in the outlets, Greece is a nice country to visit, it’s very inviting and so I hope they can control the theft issue. When we reported the theft, the mall security cant do anything about it. They said that the best thing they can do for us is to retrieve the wallet when they find it. Another problem is, the nearest police station was 30 minutes away. And there’s no assurance that they’ll do something about it as based on what the mall admin told us, there’s no law that would help us with theft… something along that line. Lesson learned… don’t bring your entire pocket money in one place.
A journey to my happy space 