Category: Greek Islands

Getting a wider perspective of Chora on Ios

Chora, the scenic main village on Ios, is viewed in this panoramic photo shot from a hilltop on the south side of town. Click on the photo to view a larger-size image.

No more squinting: The narrow display column on my blog limits the size of photos I can publish — and that simply doesn’t do justice to panoramic or widescreen pictures that must be scrunched to fit the tight space. But the new app I mentioned in my previous post (the one below, featuring photos from our hike in the valley above Aegiali on Amorgos) now lets me publish pictures that will literally pop out of the page into a larger, easier-on-the-eyes format when you click on them.

This gives me the chance to share some shots of what is not only one of the most picturesque towns in the Cyclades, but also one of my favourite Greek Island villages — Chora, on Ios (often called Ios Town by many).

A typical Cycladic village of whitewashed buildings and blue-domed churches, Chora straddles the top of a wide hill roughly midway between the Gialos port and beautiful Mylopotas beach. The village actually is wedged between three other hills, including one to the south, one to the east, and an even bigger rocky peak to the north.

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October 23, 2012
The valley above Aegiali

Looking toward the whitewashed houses of Langada village from the opposite side of the vast valley above Aegiali Bay on Amorgos. Click on the photo to view a larger-size image.

Ahhh-morgos! A friend planning a short trip to Amorgos contacted me last week, asking for some travel advice and links to my photos so she could take a sneak peak at the scenery she and her travel companion would soon be enjoying first-hand.

While I was scouring my computer for information and photos from our visit to Amorgos in 2009, I discovered a series of panoramic pictures I haven’t posted either here on the blog, or in any of my online albums, because the images are simply too large. When re-sized to fit in the narrow column on the blog, the photos would be almost too small to view. Some would be so tiny, I thought it would be a waste of time to publish them. But then another friend familiar with the technical workings of WordPress blogs showed me a handy-dandy trick for displaying larger images.

Photos from our half-day hike around Aegiali valley

I decided to give it a try, so below is a series of photos that we shot during a half-day hike around the valley above Aegiali Bay. (Amorgos is a hiker’s paradise, and the valley walk is just one of many incredibly scenic routes on the island.)

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October 6, 2012
At this cozy cafe in Chora on Folegandros, customers can read more than just the menu

With its wide variety of reading material (as well as food and beverages), this café on Folegandros gives a whole new meaning to the expression “book a table”

The café tables and books are in shade while a lush canopy of bougainvillea vines catches the brilliant morning sunshine above a row of whitewashed houses

The café is situated in one of the three charming town squares in Chora village. Filled with taverna tables, the squares are all shaded by plane trees.

A customer writes in her journal while enjoying a coffee in the quiet square

August 4, 2012
2012 Greek holiday trip report: Mykonos Part 2

Mid-morning view from Hotel Tagoo of the Mykonos New Port at Tourlos …

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… where the 2,400-passenger Norwegian Jade is docked for the day

Here’s a videoclip showing the morning views from Hotel Tagoo

Wednesday May 16

I awoke to an absolutely gorgeous Mykonos morning. Sunny skies and warm temperatures promised perfect weather for a beach day. From the terrace outside the hotel breakfast room, I could see four cruise ships including the Norwegian Jade docked at the New Port and the Azamara Quest, Windstar Wind Spirit, and Seabourn Quest, all anchored near the Old Port. I made plans to hit the beach for the afternoon then spend the evening in Mykonos Town where, I assumed, the streets would be lively and teeming with tourists from the cruise ships.

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August 4, 2012
Greece holiday pic of the day

A rugged rock cliff provides a backdrop to a colourful church belltower at the beach resort area of Perissa on Santorini

August 3, 2012
Greece holiday pic of the day

A succulent plant decorates a rustic window frame at a house in Naxos Town

August 2, 2012
Greece holiday pic of the day

Decorative cast iron railings on a building in the town of Vathi on Samos

August 1, 2012
2012 Greek holiday trip report: Mykonos Part 1

Air Transat logo on a winglet of the Airbus jet that flew me from Toronto to Athens

My Mykonos, Paros and Attica/Glyfada trip report

What follows is an edited and significantly expanded version of a trip report I posted on TripAdvisor.com shortly after returning from my holiday in Greece this past spring. I have added more extensive details to the text, and have included dozens of photographs to illustrate the report.

Sunday May 13: Flight from Toronto to Athens

I flew Air Transat, the Canadian charter airline I have flown on all of my trips to Greece. The flight was about two-thirds full when it left Toronto just past lunchtime on Sunday May 13. It stopped in Montreal for 90 minutes to collect more passengers and load the food and beverage carts for our 9-hour overnight flight to Athens. During the stopover, a flight attendant told a passenger sitting behind me that, with the additional passengers from Montreal, the flight was nearly full. (On all of my previous flights to Greece, except one, we flew direct to Athens; this year, Air Transat’s May flights stopped in Montreal because fewer people were travelling to Greece at the time and there wasn’t enough passenger demand to justify direct flights from both cities.)

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July 23, 2012