The second day in Mykonos we woke up well rested and headed out for breakfast. Here we are in front of our wonderful hotel:
It was already so warm that morning. We walked through the sweet streets of Mykonos with their freshly painted homes and cobblestone streets:
Everything in town is white with colorful accents:
Down in the harbor of Mykonos Town there was a little farmer's market going on and all the cutest old men from the island were sitting around selling their vegetables:
Amalia went up and admired one of the melons a vendor was selling and so he gave it to her! We ended up eating it with our breakfast.
This is the view of the harbor from where we were sitting eating breakfast:
Here is Jamie ready for breakfast:
And admiring the view:
Here I am waiting to order:
We were kind of starving at this point and I think Amalia was off getting her fruit. We needed her guidance in what to order! I ended up getting a delicious omelette with some serious Greek cheese in it:
In fact, it was so strong in cheesiness that I had to share part of Jamie's non-cheese omelette so I didn't get cheesed-out. Jamie and I also ordered a Greek coffee to share:
I had been treated to Greek coffee before by Amalia when she lived in LA so I knew it was an intense flavor experience! Jamie and I shared the cup and then took a picture of the grounds at the bottom because those are supposed to tell your fortune:
Amalia wasn't sure what our grounds were saying and we all concluded that since we both drank it the fortunes got a bit confused. Here are the happy girls trying not to get blown away:
It was really windy that morning in the harbor--we had to keep holding our napkins and silverware down. After breakfast I checked out the fresh fish market/stand:
Yikes, some barely dead fish were just hanging out there:
Here is a beautifully framed shot courtesy of Amalia:
We went into the church behind us in the photo above and lit some candles:
The church is tiny as most are on the island--just mini-chapels really:
I think maybe 10 people could fit inside that place at one time. I love the view outside the church, all the locals sitting in the shade as the temperature just keeps climbing:
We walked around the side of the island to a part of town we hadn't walked through yet and that is where we found Petrus:
He is the big bird/mascot of Mykonos and is very famous. He is really big and rather friendly so we got in close to check him out:
He is very beautiful with soft white feathers and a multi-colored beak:
You can tell he is making sure I get a good angle because he wants everyone to know how beautiful he is:
Here is from the other side, I was kind of involved in getting a lot of pictures of him because he was so amazingly still but so large and probably capable of doing great harm if I pissed him off:
So Amalia had us pose next to him but he wouldn't turn around and face the camera:
So I was petting him while facing the camera (posed for a good picture of course) and then all of the sudden I felt something nibbling on me and I screamed and grabbed Jamie right as Amalia snapped the picture:
I think Petrus was mad at me at this point:
He'd clearly had enough and wasn't going to play nice anymore!
Check out the tip of that beak that was pecking on me:
Here I am trying to make nice with Petrus but he wasn't having it:
So we walked on to a beautifully, characteristically Greek sight:
Here we are blending into the tree, another beautiful shot by Amalia:
Then I walked down behind the church and out onto the rocky edge of the island where I got a glimpse of the windmills--the four white, round structures in the far background:
And this was the view looking the other way across the wide mouth of the harbor into Mykonos Town and another neighboring island in the distance:
We walked through town while it was still cool enough and we did some shopping. I love the look of these balconies--the white and blue is so gorgeous with the island surroundings:
I bought this beach cover up while shopping in town and it matched perfectly with my 2 euro bathing suit from Florence:
After shopping, we got into our little rental car and headed out to another different beach. There are about 50 beaches on Mykonos, this tiny little island. This is what the terrain looked like as Amalia was driving us (quickly!):
Actually, it was great having Amalia (an experienced Greek driver) get us around--we wouldn't have wanted to do that by ourselves! Lots of "fences" are made of rock:
And there is a lot of open land for such a destination island--I figured it would have been more populated with civilization. But Amalia tells me that a lot of land is protected from development. If anything of archaeological interest is found then all development must cease until proper excavations are made. As Amalia proudly informed me, this is very historical land. Here is the view as we drove over the hills and headed to the beach down in that bay below:
Wow:
This spot was gorgeous and there were maybe only about 20 people enjoying it:
This is just ridiculous:
We went swimming and then warmed ourselves in the sun for awhile but it didn't take long until I was feeling overly hot so we headed up to the open restaurant/bar in order to get some refreshment and enjoy the view from a large cushy couch/bench thing. This was our view:
This is what the restaurant looked like:
They had tables but also benches with lots of cushions to relax on.
And the bathroom was kind of interesting as well--it was kind of outdoors with no real roof and was made out of these stones:
And it had a large window in it and beautiful plants. If it's possible, it was a very enchanting bathroom. But back to the view:
This was the perfect place to enjoy the beach. We had already swum and enjoyed the crystal clear water so now the bar was great--we curled up on the couches and just talked:
And Amalia helped us order some food:
There was this fried cheese thing that was wonderfully delicious:
And some zucchini meatballs (which have no meat in them):
And of course we ate lots of bread with olive oil. The Greek olive oil is actually better than the Italian. I know I seem like a traitor but I did do a pretty solid taste comparison and I feel qualified to make that judgment! Even though the Italians are more famous for their olive oil, if you can get your hands on some authentic Greek olive oil--you'll taste the difference. Speaking of Greek pride, here is the flag, proudly flown over the beach!:
Here we are lounging on the couch (we look silly but we had to get a picture with the view in the background):
Here I am with Amalia and my frappe drink:
The frappe is a super strong Greek coffee and I needed a LOT of sugar to get it down. Here is another view of the restaurant:
As we left the beach we drove past this cow sitting in the sun:
And Amalia stopped especially so I could get a picture! We drove back to the fancy beach we had been to the day before but this time we were there later in the afternoon so we didn't buy the lounge chairs. Instead we found a nice spot in the sand and dove in to the water. Jamie didn't feel like swimming anymore but I was eager to go in again. Amalia and I swam around with our tops off and were enjoying the crispness of the water--then she asked what picture I would use when I wrote about this in my blog. So I called to Jamie and she got this picture of us trying to prove that we were topless!:
You can't really tell but we were! It is really a different experience for those of you haven't tried it! The sun was setting kind of rapidly and we had to keep swimming further and further over to stay in the sun. Finally I realized I was really cold so we got out and dried off. Jamie had been sitting on the sand for a long time and though entertained by Italian Cosmo magazine (not really) she was throughly done with sitting next to a group of tourists who turned out to be on some kind of fitness retreat. They started doing some strange form of yoga on the beach (and speaking in English) and it was just about all Jamie could handle. I could tell the whole scene was a little bit too ridiculous--enjoy the beach for goodness sake, there's no need to get all yogic on it. Here is the beach scene at dusk:
It was kind of cool that night so not many people were still out on the beach. We dried off and then sat down at the restaurant right on the beach. Here is beautiful Amalia flirting with our cute waiter:
What a cutie:
He was really embarrassed that I was taking his picture. Here is another Amalia shot of me:
It was so beautiful and peaceful on the beach at the end of the day:
There were lots of people in the restaurant and they had a DJ playing some really loud music--Amalia was really excited because all of the music was really great Greek music (contemporary) that she loved.
After dinner we dropped Amalia off at the airport. She had a late flight back to Athens because she had to be at work the next day. After dropping her off I had to drive our rental car back to the office to turn it in. Fortunately, it was all in a straight line and down hill at that so even though I hadn't driven a stick shift in a couple of years and I had never driven on a Greek island, I managed to squeeze it into the spot where the rest of the rental cars were. Unfortunately, we hadn't checked on how late the office was open...and they were closed. I didn't want to leave it in the lot because it was a lot that was shared by other businesses and I would have been blocking some other cars in. And I didn't want to leave the keys in the car for obvious reasons. So we had to turn around and I had to pull the car back out of the squished parking spot (Jamie was out on the street directing me, trying to keep from hitting the bus that was loading up people for other destinations around the island). Then we had to drive back uphill (ack, in a stick) and into this mass parking lot that was more like an offroad track. I'm still not sure how I managed to back that vehicle into the parking spot (aka, mound of dirt) and not pop a tire on the huge dirt holes or drive it over the cliff. Phew. We made it safely out of the car and that was the last I had to drive in Greece. Ten minutes of vehicular excitement was all I needed. Oh, I forgot to mention that I hadn't driven ANY car in over three months at this point--so I realllllly wasn't qualified to be off-roading in a stick shift rental car in Greece! Super-fortunately for us, our sweet hotel manager (having heard our story of parking the car) called the proprietor of the rental car and arranged with him to settle the bill and leave the keys with him (the hotel guy--apparently they are friends). By now it wasn't super late but we were exhausted and opted for our beds rather than the crazy nightlife Mykonos is famous for. The next day we were heading to Delos!
It was already so warm that morning. We walked through the sweet streets of Mykonos with their freshly painted homes and cobblestone streets:
Everything in town is white with colorful accents:
Down in the harbor of Mykonos Town there was a little farmer's market going on and all the cutest old men from the island were sitting around selling their vegetables:
Amalia went up and admired one of the melons a vendor was selling and so he gave it to her! We ended up eating it with our breakfast.
This is the view of the harbor from where we were sitting eating breakfast:
Here is Jamie ready for breakfast:
And admiring the view:
Here I am waiting to order:
We were kind of starving at this point and I think Amalia was off getting her fruit. We needed her guidance in what to order! I ended up getting a delicious omelette with some serious Greek cheese in it:
In fact, it was so strong in cheesiness that I had to share part of Jamie's non-cheese omelette so I didn't get cheesed-out. Jamie and I also ordered a Greek coffee to share:
I had been treated to Greek coffee before by Amalia when she lived in LA so I knew it was an intense flavor experience! Jamie and I shared the cup and then took a picture of the grounds at the bottom because those are supposed to tell your fortune:
Amalia wasn't sure what our grounds were saying and we all concluded that since we both drank it the fortunes got a bit confused. Here are the happy girls trying not to get blown away:
It was really windy that morning in the harbor--we had to keep holding our napkins and silverware down. After breakfast I checked out the fresh fish market/stand:
Yikes, some barely dead fish were just hanging out there:
Here is a beautifully framed shot courtesy of Amalia:
We went into the church behind us in the photo above and lit some candles:
The church is tiny as most are on the island--just mini-chapels really:
I think maybe 10 people could fit inside that place at one time. I love the view outside the church, all the locals sitting in the shade as the temperature just keeps climbing:
We walked around the side of the island to a part of town we hadn't walked through yet and that is where we found Petrus:
He is the big bird/mascot of Mykonos and is very famous. He is really big and rather friendly so we got in close to check him out:
He is very beautiful with soft white feathers and a multi-colored beak:
You can tell he is making sure I get a good angle because he wants everyone to know how beautiful he is:
Here is from the other side, I was kind of involved in getting a lot of pictures of him because he was so amazingly still but so large and probably capable of doing great harm if I pissed him off:
So Amalia had us pose next to him but he wouldn't turn around and face the camera:
So I was petting him while facing the camera (posed for a good picture of course) and then all of the sudden I felt something nibbling on me and I screamed and grabbed Jamie right as Amalia snapped the picture:
I think Petrus was mad at me at this point:
He'd clearly had enough and wasn't going to play nice anymore!
Check out the tip of that beak that was pecking on me:
Here I am trying to make nice with Petrus but he wasn't having it:
So we walked on to a beautifully, characteristically Greek sight:
Here we are blending into the tree, another beautiful shot by Amalia:
Then I walked down behind the church and out onto the rocky edge of the island where I got a glimpse of the windmills--the four white, round structures in the far background:
And this was the view looking the other way across the wide mouth of the harbor into Mykonos Town and another neighboring island in the distance:
We walked through town while it was still cool enough and we did some shopping. I love the look of these balconies--the white and blue is so gorgeous with the island surroundings:
I bought this beach cover up while shopping in town and it matched perfectly with my 2 euro bathing suit from Florence:
After shopping, we got into our little rental car and headed out to another different beach. There are about 50 beaches on Mykonos, this tiny little island. This is what the terrain looked like as Amalia was driving us (quickly!):
Actually, it was great having Amalia (an experienced Greek driver) get us around--we wouldn't have wanted to do that by ourselves! Lots of "fences" are made of rock:
And there is a lot of open land for such a destination island--I figured it would have been more populated with civilization. But Amalia tells me that a lot of land is protected from development. If anything of archaeological interest is found then all development must cease until proper excavations are made. As Amalia proudly informed me, this is very historical land. Here is the view as we drove over the hills and headed to the beach down in that bay below:
Wow:
This spot was gorgeous and there were maybe only about 20 people enjoying it:
This is just ridiculous:
We went swimming and then warmed ourselves in the sun for awhile but it didn't take long until I was feeling overly hot so we headed up to the open restaurant/bar in order to get some refreshment and enjoy the view from a large cushy couch/bench thing. This was our view:
This is what the restaurant looked like:
They had tables but also benches with lots of cushions to relax on.
And the bathroom was kind of interesting as well--it was kind of outdoors with no real roof and was made out of these stones:
And it had a large window in it and beautiful plants. If it's possible, it was a very enchanting bathroom. But back to the view:
This was the perfect place to enjoy the beach. We had already swum and enjoyed the crystal clear water so now the bar was great--we curled up on the couches and just talked:
And Amalia helped us order some food:
There was this fried cheese thing that was wonderfully delicious:
And some zucchini meatballs (which have no meat in them):
And of course we ate lots of bread with olive oil. The Greek olive oil is actually better than the Italian. I know I seem like a traitor but I did do a pretty solid taste comparison and I feel qualified to make that judgment! Even though the Italians are more famous for their olive oil, if you can get your hands on some authentic Greek olive oil--you'll taste the difference. Speaking of Greek pride, here is the flag, proudly flown over the beach!:
Here we are lounging on the couch (we look silly but we had to get a picture with the view in the background):
Here I am with Amalia and my frappe drink:
The frappe is a super strong Greek coffee and I needed a LOT of sugar to get it down. Here is another view of the restaurant:
As we left the beach we drove past this cow sitting in the sun:
And Amalia stopped especially so I could get a picture! We drove back to the fancy beach we had been to the day before but this time we were there later in the afternoon so we didn't buy the lounge chairs. Instead we found a nice spot in the sand and dove in to the water. Jamie didn't feel like swimming anymore but I was eager to go in again. Amalia and I swam around with our tops off and were enjoying the crispness of the water--then she asked what picture I would use when I wrote about this in my blog. So I called to Jamie and she got this picture of us trying to prove that we were topless!:
You can't really tell but we were! It is really a different experience for those of you haven't tried it! The sun was setting kind of rapidly and we had to keep swimming further and further over to stay in the sun. Finally I realized I was really cold so we got out and dried off. Jamie had been sitting on the sand for a long time and though entertained by Italian Cosmo magazine (not really) she was throughly done with sitting next to a group of tourists who turned out to be on some kind of fitness retreat. They started doing some strange form of yoga on the beach (and speaking in English) and it was just about all Jamie could handle. I could tell the whole scene was a little bit too ridiculous--enjoy the beach for goodness sake, there's no need to get all yogic on it. Here is the beach scene at dusk:
It was kind of cool that night so not many people were still out on the beach. We dried off and then sat down at the restaurant right on the beach. Here is beautiful Amalia flirting with our cute waiter:
What a cutie:
He was really embarrassed that I was taking his picture. Here is another Amalia shot of me:
It was so beautiful and peaceful on the beach at the end of the day:
There were lots of people in the restaurant and they had a DJ playing some really loud music--Amalia was really excited because all of the music was really great Greek music (contemporary) that she loved.
After dinner we dropped Amalia off at the airport. She had a late flight back to Athens because she had to be at work the next day. After dropping her off I had to drive our rental car back to the office to turn it in. Fortunately, it was all in a straight line and down hill at that so even though I hadn't driven a stick shift in a couple of years and I had never driven on a Greek island, I managed to squeeze it into the spot where the rest of the rental cars were. Unfortunately, we hadn't checked on how late the office was open...and they were closed. I didn't want to leave it in the lot because it was a lot that was shared by other businesses and I would have been blocking some other cars in. And I didn't want to leave the keys in the car for obvious reasons. So we had to turn around and I had to pull the car back out of the squished parking spot (Jamie was out on the street directing me, trying to keep from hitting the bus that was loading up people for other destinations around the island). Then we had to drive back uphill (ack, in a stick) and into this mass parking lot that was more like an offroad track. I'm still not sure how I managed to back that vehicle into the parking spot (aka, mound of dirt) and not pop a tire on the huge dirt holes or drive it over the cliff. Phew. We made it safely out of the car and that was the last I had to drive in Greece. Ten minutes of vehicular excitement was all I needed. Oh, I forgot to mention that I hadn't driven ANY car in over three months at this point--so I realllllly wasn't qualified to be off-roading in a stick shift rental car in Greece! Super-fortunately for us, our sweet hotel manager (having heard our story of parking the car) called the proprietor of the rental car and arranged with him to settle the bill and leave the keys with him (the hotel guy--apparently they are friends). By now it wasn't super late but we were exhausted and opted for our beds rather than the crazy nightlife Mykonos is famous for. The next day we were heading to Delos!
