On to the last island

I'm finally almost getting caught up! I was having issues charging my laptop which are now resolved enough that I can manage because as it turns out, this sort of bereft-looking hillside (otherwise known in Mykonos as "land") actually has a bike shop, a gas station, a health care center, a supermarket, a coffee shop and an electronics shop within a few hundred feet. When I knew I needed a new cable, I did a search of the island to find the right kind of electronics store (as in not the kind that sells refrigerators) and realized that there was one directly across the road from the hotel, so we strolled in, bought the cable and came back in less than 5 minutes.

So yes, we're on Mykonos- the party island. Being here offseason is kind of like being at the Jersey shore in March or April. Most things are open but nothing is crowded and it's kind of pleasant. It must be hellish in the summer, with those cute little "streets" packed with tan, shiny, perfumed beachgoers looking to buy a new designer t-shirt. I got a taste of it when a cruise docked and disgorged hundreds of people into the town. It became almost impossible to move around. Resort stuff aside, beach towns are all kind of similar, be they on the east coast barrier islands or in the Caribbean. Lots of small shops, long strips with clothing and souvenir stores, a beachside strand with restaurants, and small hotels. There's something relaxing about it when it's relatively empty. 

Mykonos is tiny, like Santorini, and has almost all of its commercial activity crammed into Mykonos Town, while Santorini has a couple of tourist towns and also some residential areas. Plus Santorini has a thriving wine industry, while Mykonos is pure tourism, 24-7, literally, I gather. There's no agriculture because, to paraphrase our guide, there's no soil. That would seem to be an impediment; people import soil, like they import water (all of these islands import water- they desalinize it but it still isn't good to drink according to everyone). 

We're staying at a boutique hotel called Vencia, which is very island resort-ish. Small and quirky, with generally high end food and drink, pool, linens and such, with personal service but missing some things that you might expect at a good hotel, like a box of tissues somewhere, like more than one outlet where you can plug in whatever electronics you might care to and maybe some drawers to put clothes away.

But we were able to have massages in the room soon after arriving, which was nice. And then we decided to walk to town. Horizontally, like on a flat map, the town looks very close and it is, in a way. The thing is that getting to the port where all the waterfront restaurants are is the equivalent of walking down 10 flights of stairs. And of course walking down isn't the entire issue. There's no place to drive or park within the town so you have to park in lots at the periphery. It's a 10 minute walk at best to the middle of town. We might do the down trip if it didn't involve and up trip as well. I've been up and down a few times, but pretty much just as exercise.

We ate at a family-run seafood restaurant in a small village, which was okay, nothing great. The most important thing we've discovered is to not use Google Maps, but Apple Maps and CarPlay instead. The Google direction are consistently confusing and not always timely. At least with CarPlay you can kind of see where you're supposed to be going, with the rule being, even if it doesn't look like a road, it probably is. 

The next morning we were picked up by a guide for visit to Delos, one of the things we were most looking forward to seeing on this trip. Delos is an island that is mythically, at least, the birthplace of the gods Apollo and Artemis. It was considered so holy that nobody was allowed to be born on the island (and therefore claim some sort of ownership or inheritance) or die (again, no permanence allowed). It grew in importance as a commercial center in the mid first century BCE, as the Athenians and then the Romans developed it as a duty-free trading center. Most central and lucrative was the slave trade, and it became a wealthy place. This, predictably, attracted the attention of pirates, who sacked and burned the place and left it abandoned and bereft.

And there is sat for about 2000 years, before some archaeologist began exploring and realized that it was the biggest and best preserved ancient city found to date. This area is not volcanic, so no earthquakes to level structures, and it's incredibly dry, so for the most part, things that were not destroyed by the pirates (and unfortunately that was many things) are still there. It's bigger than Pompeii and was never buried. Of course, there were no gravesites because you were forbidden to die there- the graves are across a narrow channel on a neighboring, similarly bereft island, where all the births took place as well. 

The part we visited was divided roughly into public and private residential areas, with the largest house covering over 6000 square feet and multistory. There also were some amazing mosaics on the floor of the living/dining rooms.

In the public area, there were temples, several to Apollo, a marketplace with shops and space for stalls, a huge customs house, a theater, and biggest of all, the slave market. I don't have a good photo of the slave market, but maybe 3 times the area of the theater?

There's apparently the world's oldest known synagogue on the other side of the island- you could really spend a week there if you wanted to see everything, but you can't. Nobody is allowed to stay there overnight except for the archaeologists, who have small houses adjacent to the ruins. You can come for a few hours but then you have to go back to Mykonos.

After resting in the room we went to dinner at a place called m-eating. I don't know what the name means, but it was a spectacularly good meal. The cocktails (AEGEAN FLAG (Gin Mediterranean Fruits & Pergamont Mandarin Sparkling Water), the wine, the starter (Scallops on baked apple powdered with orange dust, citrus filets and citrus vinaigrette) was beautifully presented and delicious. The mains were stuffed croaker fish with mixed herb pesto, broccoli flowers and mash accompanied with tomato gazpacho and caviar (even better than it sounds) and a lamb shank special that was the best lamb dish I've had in recent memory. Dessert was "Rich almond cream on a cracked "amygdaloto", sprinkled with crispy almond brittle and almond-flavored ice cream." I don't know what an amygdalato is, so I don't know why they put it in quotes. I didn't notice that it was shaped like your amygdala, aka your lizard brain. And then they brought somethings else that we were too full to do more than take bite. FYI, pretty consistently, Greek restaurants will bring you a dessert even if you don't order one. It's happened on multiple occasions in high end and casual places. It feels very hospitable.

So that was the end of Thursday and Friday. One more full day on Mykonos, which is one more than necessary but I'll talk more about that in the next post.