On Island Time

After our final enjoyable week with our family in Czechia, Ellie and I moved on to a new country for both of us – Greece. Our first days were spent on the gorgeous island of Naxos, part of the Cyclades group of islands in the Aegean Sea. We had a 2.5 hour flight from Prague to Athens and then a short 25 minute puddle jumper across from Athens.

The views on the flight were beautiful, but I wouldn’t be getting any good pics today – the windows were some of the dirtiest I’d seen in a long time (Greece and in particular the islands are quite windy and dusty in the summer).

Here’s the SkyExpress ATR72 that brought us over from Athens as the sun set behind the airport.

The air terminal was tiny. This building was literally all of it, and not even the second floor was a public space; I assume that was offices.

The baggage claim was this miniscule room behind Ellie. What you’re seeing through the door and windows was about 80% of the bag claim room. I wish I’d got a pic of the inside as it was just a small roller belt with a ramp agent shoving the bags through from the other side.

Before too long, we arrived at our home for the next 3 days, a small family run hotel just a bit west of the airport.

The onsite restaurant had some really delicious offerings. In addition to breakfasts, we had 2 dinners there during our stay and they were very, very good.

The pool was utilized heavily by Ellie the next morning.

And before it got too windy, we went down to the beach which was about one minute away down a nice stone path.

This was our first introduction to the prolific stray cat population, including a few regulars around the hotel. There are an estimated 3 million stray cats in Greece.

In our rented car, we drove all the way across the island, going through very rugged terrain across the middle of Naxos. There were many spectacular views along the way, but it was hard to stop for many photos due to the winding narrow roads. The average speed on the 90 minute drive was 35 km/h. This is the small town of Filoti which we’d driven through already along a very crowded main street.

Many hill tops in Greece have a small white church right at the summit. Many of these are named after Prophet Elijah (Profitis Ilias) as he is associated with mountaintops in the bible. They make for good pictures.

We had a lunch stop in the pretty little town of Apeiranthos at a small cafe with really good pizza.

And then walked around a bit afterwards. It would have been nice to arrive here earlier and stay for longer.

As we set out further along our journey to Panermos, we stopped for a photo looking back at Apeiranthos on its mountainside perch.

One of the flew places that had sufficient room to safely pull our Yaris over on the way down the mountains to the sea.

The larger island to the left, Donousa, is inhabited but the others in the foreground are not. The cluster of buildings on the right side of the peninsula is a village that we’ll pass through shortly; Moutsouna.

This tiny chapel right on the side of the road must have a meaning or memorial significance. I would love to find out the story about it, as it was much larger than one of the smaller kandylakia which are plentiful.

About an hour after leaving Apeiranthos we arrived at the far southeast corner of Naxos, at the small village of Panermos.

Looks like someone decided the view was so nice they parked their van here for good!

The last bit of the road down to the back was unexpectedly very rough in contrast to the smoothly paved road we’d driven on the rest of the way.

Surprisingly, the beach had palm trees, and was a real oasis, being sheltered from the prevailing north winds.

We’re down here today to go on a boat trip to swim at Rina Cave, about a pleasant 30 minute cruise from the dock here.

Here’s the cave, which already has a couple of other swimmers from another group entering. It wasn’t busy at all though, I think we saw 10 other people there the whole time. It was such cool experience going in the cave and I wished that I had a waterproof case for my phone to get some good pics of it, as it became quite shallow at the end and both Ellie and I were able to stand on the rocks with our heads out of the water.

Ellie got a chance to try her hand at steering the boat on the way back, courtesy of the captain/owner, Yiannis.

We made a stop at another swimming cove on the way back, and also enjoyed a glass of wine and Greek salad for a snack. This trip was definitely one of the highlights of our whole visit to Greece. And inexpensive, too!

Ellie stated that the outhouse at the parking lot was “the coolest outhouse she’s seen”.

We actually had a longer time on the boat than planned, so we were still up in the mountains at sunset, which worked out great for a photo stop at the same place we’d stopped on the way up in the morning.

Our second day was quite windy (as it often is) from the north, so we headed to the south side of the island again but this time just a short 30 minute drive to Alyko beach; an undeveloped public beach that was a short walk through cedar shrubs with plenty of space and some nice smooth sand.

Ellie had a fun time digging in the sand in between swims.

There was another tiny chapel beside the beach.

We explored an abandoned resort at the far end of the beach just beyond the chapel, through some more cedars, full of colorful graffiti and some dangerous spots.

We moved down the road to a hotel to have lunch at their terrace. I treated myself to a Greek beer for the occasion, along with a hearty burger.

In the evening, we ventured into Naxos town to catch sunset at the Temple of Apollo which is on a promontory in the harbor.

Unfortunately due to a recent incident where a tourist was picking up the marble slabs for social media, pics, the temple ruins are actually fenced off now and you can’t get right up to them anymore.

It was a very popular spot but we still got some great pics at the Portara, the 2500 year old gate made of Naxian marble.

After the sun went down, we walked around in the town a bit and grabbed a delicious and cheap dinner at a local taverna.

I got some retsina – a classic Greek wine made with pine resin – definitely unique and only available in smaller places. I wanted to bring some home as a souvenir but didn’t see it anywhere in Athens.

It was a very nice evening. I would definitely spend some more time in town here if we were able to come again.