#do you love the colour of mêlée island | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

peter-horrocks · 7 years ago

Text

Greece and the islands near Athens

Having just returned from a work trip to Greece for Villas du Monde visiting recently added villas and new ones, as well as meeting contacts for future expansion, I am reeling somewhat from the impression the Greek experience has left me with this time.

Porch of the Maidens on the Erechtheion

It is not the first time I have been on such a visit, indeed I've spent much of my life contracting holiday homes in France and Italy in particular. Greece is fairly new for me though I have been nurturing Crete for a while. I first ventured to the Greek mainland last year and this time around I felt much more comfortable as I renewed acquaintances and due to the dropping of mobile roaming charges in Europe, I could use google maps (and rather helpfully it spoke in the original programmed language). The very expensive hire car GPS full of Greek names had me quite traumatised previously.

By the way for anyone thinking of getting into the travel business, contracting is a role I heartily recommend as you really do get to see a lot, though it can be hard to maintain your love life as you are often away from home. You can also get on your friend's nerves if you bang on about your travels too much as they would rather be talking about the episode of Coronation Street which you missed. That's where a blog comes in handy as you can let it all out and only people who are interested need read it.

My aim on this visit was to consolidate and expand carefully the choice of villas within reasonable driving distance of Athens. This is important as the French clients don't have the same wide range of low-cost options as the UK, Germany and Holland, most of their flights are direct to the Greek capital.

So the target areas were the Athens Riviera, Peloponnese and three islands which are really easy to get to from the mainland, principally Lefkas and Evia which have connecting bridges along with Spetses which is just ten minutes in a water taxi.

From where I live in Grasse it was a fair old drive up to Lyon to get a flight with Transavia which is a really good new low-cost flight operator co-owned by Air France and KLM. The flight landed in the evening so it made sense to make Sunday a rest day and visit the Acropolis, which I tried to squeeze in last time but was thwarted by a lack of time and a sponsored run which blocked the bus route.

We (my French wife came with me, thankfully, as it is dull driving around even fantastic places on your own) did get to visit the Parthenon which was well worth it even though there is a huge renovation job going on which means there was lots of scaffolding and big cranes. It was actually European museum day so the visit was free. But that meant there were thousands of people cramming in during mid-day and due to the crowds and heat we abandoned half way up, unlike some of the poor tour groups who were stuck in the mêlée with their guides tragically continuing their spiel on the artistic merits of the majestic columns whilst their audience only sought desperately to escape.

The Acropolis museum which opened recently was our fallback and it proved to be fantastic, it is stuffed with cleverly displayed statues and plaques from the site and from the top floor, there is a fabulous view of the Acropolis. We went back to the Parthenon towards evening when the crowds had gone (it was free entry again so no loss) and armed with a nourishing, inexpensive selection of excellent non-sugared cranberries, natural almonds and peanuts snack bought from one of the old boy barrow vendors we cherished the moment.

The Acropolis Museum in Athens

Next day we drove to Porto Heli (also known as Porto Cheli) where we checked in to the most luxurious hotel I have ever stayed in which I had been fortunate to find at a very cheap promotional price for two nights. We dropped our bags and dashed to catch a water taxi (23 € one way however many people you are up to around 10) from Kosta which was about ten minutes drive (plenty of parking space to leave the car).

The main harbour of Spetses town on the island of Spetses

The rest of the afternoon was spent wandering the glorious island of Spetses, admiring its colonial architecture (said to be the most impressive in Greece), the fortifications with old cannons everywhere and visiting the villa (now on the VDM website) which was just within walking distance of the main harbour.

The water taxi between Spetses and Porto Heli

The following day was intense, I visited nine luxurious villas in Porto Heli with the local contact. It is an exclusive sort of place, for VIP clients really. Most of the villas are either waterfront or nearly, some with near private beaches, quite a few with private tennis courts, all near moorings from where you can hail a water taxi to Spetses which is apparently the done thing for an evening out. This is a place frequented by royalty. In the evening we ate in a delightful restaurant with our feet practically in the water, in a traffic free zone it was lovely and peaceful in late September, lovely food too.

One of the near private beaches in Porto Heli

Our next encounter was with a new contact who was presenting us a villa on the Athens Riviera. She has more on the more popular islands of Mykonos, Paros and Santorini but I wanted to be sure of the standard of a house first. As it was it was brilliant and it will go in the range. It was the first rental property I have come across with a tortoise in the garden, which the charming owner was clearly pleased to introduce us to.

I had booked a cheap (I have to work within quite a tight budget otherwise they won't send me again) and not very cheerful looking hotel for the night as there wasn't much available in the area so the night ahead was not promising. On the way, we passed the southern cape of Athens and I noticed a sign for an architectural site. Arriving at the hotel which was as expected I asked about the site. The owner looked at her watch and said: "it is Poseidon's temple and if you hurry you will get there for sunset". Wow, what a spectacle! It was one of the best moments ever.

Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion

No time to rest we were up early and in the car to drive up to the island of Evia (or Euboea, which the French call Eubée, I do struggle a bit to know which to use sometimes). It is located an hours drive north of Athens (I should mention that nearly all the driving was on very good motorways). There were clients staying in the villa we visited and as it is in a less fashionable area though on the edge of a protected nature zone I was interested to see what they had to say. They were from Canada, spending time away from the harsh winter over there. They loved the villa, loved the peace and quiet of the area and the local nature, the hills covered in olive groves, the sea views.

In fact, they had decided to move to Greece to live. Their only bad experience during their month's long stay was a house they had rented the week before through one of those sites where you go directly to the owner. "It was in Santorini, located right under the flight path, you could read the writing on the underside of the planes" they repeated numerous times. "Unbelievably the guy on holiday in the house next door goes back each year" they repeated even more. "Nobody mentioned it in the description. Our nerves were shredded after the first day." I gave them my card as that sort of bad experience is exactly what a good holiday rental agency like Villas du Monde prevents because the villas are checked by experienced people with professional standards unlike those listed on the trip, book, home sites etc. which no one remotely qualified lays an eye on.

That night we stayed in the hotel belonging to one of our owners and spent the next morning discussing his project to buy the villa next door and build a pool. He welcomed my advice and suggestions and intends to go ahead, it will be on the VDM website next year. I thanked him for letting us stay, he wouldn't let me pay, said that I should consider this hotel as my home. You can't help but like the Greeks.

The Rio–Antirrio Bridge, also known as the Charilaos Trikoupis Bridge

In the morning we drove along the newly opened motorway (A8 Athens to Patras) to Lekas island (also known as Lefkada), crossing the most magnificent suspension bridge I have ever seen, at 2880 metres it is one of the longest in the world. They say Greece is broke and it's true many people are having a torrid time but that has not stopped them pushing ahead with major infrastructure projects which will surely benefit them in the long term. It takes around five hours to get to Lefkas from Athens though as three-quarters of it is on the motorway with just the last section (soon to be motorway too apparently) on the rather scenic main road.

We checked in to a hotel on the pedestrian street of Lefkada town, which was unfortunately close to the two late night bars which were still in full swing. That didn't stop us from enjoying the town's beautiful island architecture, dominated by colourful tin-walled buildings. With a somewhat overwhelming choice of restaurants, we opted for the one with most people and just one free table to enjoy the best meal either of us had eaten for a long time, great value too. Lefkada town is lovely, car-free centre and very tasteful, in September not too busy either.

Waterfront cafes in Lefkada

In the morning I drove up to meet the local contact who showed me around one of the five executive villas located in a fabulous situation up on the hillside looking back over Lefkada, the sea and the surrounding mountains. I was quite overwhelmed by the beauty of it all. The villa was perfect, worth every euro (not expensive actually) and I could see why more clients would be arriving later in the day. It was lucky I was there on a Saturday change-over morning to be able to get to see inside.

Lovely architecture in Lefkada town

From there we drove along the east coast towards Nidri though still high in the hills to another group of five villas, again all with their own private swimming pool. These were older than the previous ones and simpler inside but up to standard all the same and reasonably inexpensive. Our contact explained that in Nidri it is more animated and you could hire motor boats (no license required) for sailing around the 25 small islands. I resolved to take a look later in the day.

Amazing views of Lefkada from the first group of executive villas

First I needed to get back to the hotel but unfortunately, part of the road had been closed for roadworks and the deviation soon became one of those google maps nightmare moments. Very lost, I did get to know a good number of pretty, small mountain villages where old ladies in black looked at me as if I'd come from Mars, vineyards too where rather surprised harvesters had to move their tractor out of the lane to let me get past, then do it again when I came back because the road had ceased to exist. After much sweating as to whether I would get the hire car back in one piece and making a few good guesses I finally made it back to base.

It was time to devote some attention to my patient wife and I suggested we drive down to Nidri to check it out. We parked on the edge of town and walked in past scooter, quad and motorbike hire shops and a motorboat rental place on the waterfront. A fairly peaceful, smallish place it seemed. Further in there were more and more shops, lots offering cruises of the islands and we started to realise it was actually quite big and busy. We wandered around to the main harbour where there was quite a commotion going on. A large cruise boat was loading up with guests for what appeared to be a Greek wedding, with late arrivals staggering along in high heels as the ramps were being raised. At the same time, an island trip cruise boat came in to dock with Greek music blasting out and most of the passengers dancing and waving their arms about.

The cruise boat depositing the wedding party on the island opposite Nidri

This coincided with the arrival of the bride on the quay who proceeded to embrace her mother and small boy and the photographer and kick up a Greek dance. It was all a bit surreal. Then we realised that the wedding party were heading to the tiny chapel on the island opposite as the cruise ship carrying them (which dwarfed the chapel) proceeded to offload over there. The bride boarded a small boat and stood at the helm like some Greek goddess and sailed over to join them. We were spellbound by it all and had a wonderful time rubbernecking.

Here comes the bride on her boat

Before we left Lekas I needed to see the west coast and the beautiful sandy beaches flanked by limestone cliffs for which the island is renowned. It added two hours to our journey but it was worth it and on departing the island we passed pink flamingos in the shallows and spotted a gorgeous house on a tiny island with its own white sandy beach and left Lefkas very impressed.

The final leg was to the villa on the nature protected peninsula near Loutraki which I recruited and visited the year before and fortunately had been very well received by a good number of VDM clients during the summer, some of whom came from Isreal which also has good direct flights to Greece.

One of the west coast beaches of Lefkas

The clients go directly to the villa but I needed to pick up the key and was given an address to go to. Except that there are two of the same and the owner had neglected to mention that it was in Loutraki. The mistake was quickly realised and we were not far away, in old Corinth. The slightly deviated route meant that we had to drive across a bridge over the Corinthian Canal. Wow, it's amazing. What a sight! Hewn out of solid rock to allow ships to connect from the Aegean Sea to the Ionian it is quite something like a huge man-made gorge.

The villa ELENA - GOC1401 where we stayed

Armed with the keys we drove to the villa and settled in for the night. The owner had very kindly offered that we stay there and it's always useful to test the goods, so to speak. He said he would come round in the morning with breakfast and we had arranged to visit a number of nearby villas for potential inclusion in the Greek portfolio as well as discuss a few projects he had in mind for his house including fencing the pool which is really rare in Greece.

The owner of the villa Elena can serve this sort of tasty Greek food for guests

At around 08.00 I received a WhatsApp message to say he would be a bit late, arriving around 10.00. So I decided to drive quickly to the nearby village for some bread and we made some toast. At around 10.30 the owner arrived with arms full of cartons of eggs, tomatoes and onions and headed for the pool house kitchen. "Sorry I am late, can I make you breakfast". I wasn't going to say no. He proceeded to knock up a wonderful breakfast, with fried onion, tomato, eggs and feta cheese seasoned with oregano and a tiny bit of chilli, It was great. Try it.

Lakeside taverna near Loutraki

We spent the day visiting villas and in the afternoon we ate in the lakeside taverna near his villa. He offered me some Ouzo which I would normally decline during the day but we were heading home the next day, the work was done and it was time to relax a bit, enjoy some squid, fabulous big juicy prawns, baked beetroot plus the tops, some local mountain grass which was like spinach when cooked (the owner wanted to show me his version so he asked for some feta and added it along with some local olive oil, it was delicious and I could clearly see why clients enjoyed his optional catering service at the villa).

We asked for them to put what we didn't eat (which was plenty as it was typical copious Greek portions) in take away boxes for my wife to eat later. In the evening my wife and I took a lovely stroll from the villa back to the lake (which is actually seawater, 800 metres deep and connected to the sea by a 100 metres long shallow canal) and watched the sunset. Perfect end to the day.

Views of the lake and sea beyond from one of the new villas near Loutraki

The following day was meant to be for packing, relaxing and killing time before our evening flight followed by a drive through the night back to Grasse. But the villa owner wanted to show me another project villa on the shore of the lake and I had to agree if the prospective new owner decided to go ahead and do some work it would be a fine inclusion in the VDM range for the following year.

We acquiesced to his kind invitation to lunch at the best tavern in the area which has the ultimate in water features, what looks like a flying tap, overlooking the sea, the speciality there being meat. We had sublime meatballs and lamb chops and of course, irresistible Tzatziki which meant we departed, literally with a taste of Greece in our mouths all the way back to our home in France.

As I said this trip to Greece left an impression.

#Greece #Greek islands #Porto Heli #Athens Riviera #Evia #Lefkas #Loutraki

0 notes