I’d better get to bed soon – our plane leaves for Athens in just under nine hours. I’ve pretty much packed. I think.

I’ve spent the last two days reading the Lonely Planet guide to the Greek Islands (thanks Ray & Viky!). They recommend watching My Big Fat Greek Wedding and Zorba The Greek (among others) before you go on a trip to Greece. So I immediately downloaded them and Jan and I watched them both. I had already seen MBFGW, but that didn’t stop my from crying through half of it. Maybe it was the ‘just got married’ thing or the ‘this is my fu*ked up Eastern European family’ thing. Either way, I like the film. I had never seen Zorba before but I had certainly heard of it. I knew it had won a few Oscars so I was really looking forward to it. In the end, I thought it was OK. Anthony Quinn was wonderful but the story lost the plot a few times and I think it was about a half an hour too long. There were a couple bits that really took my by surprise. I couldn’t tell if it was an accurate depiction of Greek life or if it went over the top and was stereotyping. I’d still recommend it.

Deciding to fly by the seat of our pants, we still don’t know where we’re going. All we know is that we fly into Athens and we want to spend most of our trip Island hopping around the Cyclades Islands. Naxos and Santorini are two definite stops but we have no idea when or how. All I know is that the sheer cliffs of Santorini’s volcanic caldera and the black volcanic sand of its beaches are among the most spectacular sites in Greece. And the main reason we’re headed to Naxos is because I stumbled across the web page for this hotel.

At first glance, the Prokopis Hotel looks simply charming. And when you find out that it only costs 15€ per person per night, it becomes Mecca. We are now on a pilgrimage. Add to this the fact that the owner, Vaggelis Kavuras, sounds like the nicest person you’d ever want to meet. You have to read this email he sent me using a thick Greek accent:

Hi again Mr Joshua

Thanks for your nice mail to me and to my hotel !
Ok when you will know when you will choice when you will come to Naxos
send
me mail or phone to me to tell me your arrival time here and I will
come to
the port with my bus to transfer you in my hotel
I wait to see you in few days

Vaggelis also said that we could rent a moped for about 9€ a day to explore the entire island. I can totally see Jan driving one of those little buggers with a huge helmet on her head and me clinging for dear life on the back. We want to see as many Greek islands as we can but, with so many beaches to explore on this island alone, it looks like we may be stuck on Naxos for quite a while.