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A MAGICAL JOURNEY ATHENS May 2 May 3 PELOPONNESE May 4 May 5 May 6 May 7 May 8 May 9 NAXOS May 10 May 11 May 12 May 13 May 14 May 15 SANTORINI May 16 May 17 May 18 May 19 May 20 May 21 May 22 TRAVEL GUIDES Mykonos Delos

May 11 - Delos and Mykonos We get up bright and early, today the three of us have booked a day trip to Delos and Mykonos. The seas are a touch rough – waves are at 2-3 metres. Our ferry, the Naxos Star, glides through the waves effortlessly. This is a luxurious boat and we all enjoy the huge spray created each time she crests a wave. After an hour or so, we reach the island of Delos. Legend has it that no one can be born or die here, and the only inhabitants are the 16 museum staff. We have only two and a half hours here so we have to move quickly. The ruins are scattered everywhere, in great quantities, all over the island. Although we have seen many ruins on our trip, nothing compares to the quantity found on Delos. Because we are limited for time, we seem to be ignoring 90% of the things we walk by - and that's really hard to believe, when you think about it! We have decided to look for the spectacular, rather than just the average. It's a big island, and there's not much time. The main sites on our agenda were the Lion Terrace, the Temple of Dionysus (for the interesting pictures!), and the mosaic floors. We were able to find all of these. Unfortunately, a lot of the mosaics have deteriorated in the open air. We did, however, find some that were in excellent condition - and tucked away. Many of the early houses had a hole in the floor. As it turned out, these people, so many thousands of years ago, had built an elaborate cistern bringing fresh water directly under the city. These wells looked to be at least 40-50 ft. deep. It was really amazing to think about just how advanced their construction techniques were. After Delos, it was a twenty-minute trip to the cosmopolitan Mykonos. We decided to have a beer immediately (the salt water of the Aegean had parched us!). We found that the allotted three and a half hours was not nearly enough to "do" Mykonos, so we chose to saunter around the beautiful streets, checking out the shops. The streets there were really confusing – narrow and winding mazelike – all the better to deter raiding pirates – us too! We eventually board our "luxury ship" and head back to Naxos. After almost disembarking at Paros we decided to wait for our own island – that was close! When we actually DID arrive at Naxos, the three of us decided to buy some meat, cheese, bread, tzatziki, olives, wine and beer – and eat dinner on our balcony. The two litre bottle of lovely 'Apelia' rose cost a whopping 940 drachma – cheaper than our coffee this morning – no wonder we like it here! Again, we had clouds wander through our sunset but nobody cared - it was beautiful. It had been a long day, so we said goodnight to Marie and decided to crash early. This would be the last time we need our alarm clock because from now on it's "beach time"!

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