Project Runaway

After a car drive across southern Italy, we boarded the first of our overnight ferries to Greece. I imagined them to be fairly basic, perhaps stereotypically blue and white. I hoped the voyage wouldn’t be too rough. When we first saw our ‘SuperFast’ ferry, our nervousness increased as it first appeared to look like a freighter. Oh boy. 

When we went to board we could see that it was newly painted, it was in fact red and white. At the ramp, stood men who all looked like waiters in vests and bowties. Now we were intrigued and definitely more optimistic! We were led to a modern wood-panelled reception, much like a hotel, and were ‘checked’ in. A bowtied porter took us to our cabin berth. The berth was spacious, the bathroom large. This was a ferry? There was a casino, gift shops, lounges, and 2 restaurants. Flat screen TVs hung on the walls in various areas and all seemed to be playing some sort of  hilarious Greek soap opera. It was on this ferry that we had the best fresh squeezed orange juice we had ever had, it was like being on a small scale cruise ship.

When we land in Patras, Greece, we then catch a bus to Athens. Athens is a big busy city that is backed by hills and flows down to the port of Pireaus. Most of the buildings are white or beige and there are no skyscrapers. Our hotel is near Plakas and is at the base of the Acropolis. It is in a perfect central location and is ironically, called Central Hotel. It is within walking distance of shops, restaurants, and almost all of the historic sites.

View from hotel terrace

We head out to explore and hopefully find more of that incredible OJ. Nicole finally succumbed to some retail therapy and gets a pair of sandals. We end a very long day (remember ferry, bus, taxi, explore, shop..) on a rooftop terrace having a fantastic dinner which we decided to end with some Ouzo. It came in tall highballs glasses filled with 1/3 ice which makes the Ouzo milky. Where was my little shot glass?! No one is suprised I can’t finish mine, and Dwayne and I are privately pleased Luc doesn’t want his.

For our last day in Athens we head up to the Acropolis. We all agree it was one of the coolest sites we have seen. It is huge and consists of 3 well perserved buildings. As it was another scorcher, we had all dressed light. Nic had on the cute little yellow jersey dress that some may remember from Mich and Dirk’s wedding. But this time she wore pantys! Well, it was very windy and lets just say that not much was left to the imagination when her little dress kept clinging to her. After several males nearly fell over trying to catch a glimpse it was decided to have an emergency retail trip were Nic returned in a lovely dark, not-so-little sundress. Her father could put his sword away.

That evening we left for Rodos on another overnight ferry while we watched Athens being swallowed by the smoke of the raging wildfires. We stayed in the town of Rodos and our hotel was on the beach and from our terrace we could see Turkey. The town was a mix of too much tourism catering to British and German tourists and a historic Old Town where shops and restaurants are contained within a fortress built by the Crusaders. Everywhere there is a strong Turkish feel as the island was part of Turkey for around 400 years until 1912.

We spent one day lazing on the beach by the hotel, doing the tourist thing, surrounded by older German ladies bathing topless.

The next day we had decided we wanted to rent scooters and explore the island but Canadians require a motorcycle license to rent in Greece, instead, we rented a small Peugot convertible. In a small town called Gennadi, we stopped and had some gyros in a local place filled with Greek fisherman. The owner gave us directions to a beach that he promised would be virtually empty. The beach stretched for kms and there was only us and some young guys skinny-dipping about 100 m down. The beach consisted of beautiful small smooth rocks of many colours and it was quite comfortable to lay on. We swam and swam, the water was 27 degrees C and with so much salt you could effortlessly float forever. 

We closed this nearly perfect day with another dinner in Old Town. Now I say nearly perfect as somewhere, somehow, Dwayne got food poisoning and less than an hour after dinner he was violently ill for the entire night and into the next day. We had our checkout extended to 2:30pm as our hydrofoil ferry to Bodrum, Turkey left at 4:30 pm. Unbelieveably, he managed to get out of bed and onto the ferry. It was good he is so brown as no one could tell that he was actually green and just hanging in there. He gritted his teeth and hung on for a bumpy 3 hr ride. 

After travelling by car, bus, and ferries, we had made it to Turkey!