I have never been one for buying holiday souvenirs. Even before I consciously made the Not Buying It choice, I don’t think I have ever brought much back from my travels. After 8 visits to Turkey I finally got aTurkish evil eye to protect my house last year, as I thought it may be my last visit to Dalyan.
Yet many years ago it seems that holiday souvenirs were important things to bring back. In just the way we all used to send postcards. Postcards are a novelty in this digital age, yet I still picked up the odd one or two when travelling, and having inherited a large box of postcards dating back to the 1930’s through to the 1970’s from my mother, sending postcards was the done thing pre internet days.
As I said, now they are a novelty, yet many of my very digitally engaged twitter friends make a big deal of sending them, as part of the digital detox when on holiday. Indeed I think I made rash promises to send some. I didn’t. And there is the 60 Postcards project that went viral, for all the right reasons. Not that I will be buying the book of course.
Often these souvenirs we picked up as a gift to family and friends, like this perhaps for granny?
I did collect badges in the 60’s and 70’s. Mom sewed them on my beanie hat.
It was our way of saying ‘look where I have been’ in the same way that uploading the photos to Facebook or our blog does now.
And as I am making choices of what to keep and what to sell or give away, deciding what is tat, treasure, vintage or retro, I remember we have these.
My husbands grandfather went to Japan in the 1920s and brought these home as a reminder of his time teaching English there. They are 90 years old. Definitely treasure then.
And because I am decluttering, and Not Buying It I try not to bring any many souvenirs back from my travels now. Tea towels from New Zealand for friends and family for two reasons.
They were easy to carry in the packs, and New Zealand make the prettiest and maybe the oddest but best quality tea towels ever.
These from Australia are pretty good too. The plan was to make them into cushion covers, but everyone who knows me, knows I can’t sew.
On my last trip I took something very precious to Santorini. I had no plans to bring anything back apart from happy memories and a sense of closure.
Of course there is a but! Yet I feel I can justify these two items unlike all the other souvenirs we have scattered around the house, these are useful and are not going to add to the mound of clutter. What are they?
I just had to get this tea as it was the best tea I have had for a long time and when I drink it I am back at Villa Nectarios.
And this shower gel. I love Korres products, they had a BOGOF offer on them.
Korres Santorini Shower Gel
And it reminds me of Santorini every day.
Santorini
What do you have that remind you of places you have visited?
There is only one reason I went to Santorini. Mom had asked for her ashes to be left there. She first went there in the 80’s with her sister in law. Every summer Mom and Brenda went island hopping in Greece. She fell in love with Santorini. And so did I.
Oia Santorini
Windmill Santorini
After just over a year since she passed away, I finally decided it was time to take Mom ‘home’. Just before she died she told me she wasn’t sure that she wanted ‘it’ to be Santorini. I think she was worried that it had changed from what she had remembered. And she had since travelled to so many other places she loved. Dalyan, Turkey being one.
After she died, I was not sure where she really wanted to be, her partner and I thought Dalyan and my daughter suggested we took her to all the places she had travelled to. A lovely idea yet limited by money, I was not sure I could fit in Thailand, Egypt, Greece, Malta, Menorca,Turkey, Hong Kong, and goodness knows where else she had visited.
Approaching Santorini by sea
I had three overseas holidays last year and took a little bit of Mom to two of those destinations and one in the UK. I may have broken a Turkish law but I knew she loved it here.
And I found the perfect place in Malta too. I chose Marsaxlokk as it is a colourful village that hosts a lively Sunday market, and no one loved a good market better than my mom. Only after I had scattered her ashes I realised that the curtains hanging in a little house overlooking the spot where I left her are identical to the ones my mother had in her home.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Mom had also been an actress and one of her very last proper outings was to Stratford-Upon-Avon to see The Tempest. I thought she may enjoy being here, in the shadow of The Royal Shakespeare Theatre.
In the shadow of The Royal shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-Upon-Avon
As time went on, I knew I really needed closure and in my heart I knew I had to take her to Santorini.
We could only get flights to Crete at this time of the year, yet I was pretty sure that we would be able to get to Santorini from there, by boat. As it was it turned out that the fast ferries were not running until 17 April and we flew home in the early hours of 18 April. At that point I was thinking I would only get a day trip to Santorini and have to spend the rest of the week on Crete.
I was not prepared to give up and with the help of a brilliant travel agent, Paleologos, in Heraklion, planned an itinerary that got us to Santorini on the 15 April via Piraeus. We would be leaving Santorini on the first fast ferry on the 17 April at 6pm, with plenty of time to get our flight at 1am on the 18th. Cutting it fine, and the Sea Cats don’t run if the weather is windy. Ah well I had taken out insurance and enhanced it to cover unexpected events, given our history of holiday almost disasters. If the weather made us stay longer in Greece, so be it.
It also meant that we would get an unexpected bonus of visiting The Acropolis in Athens.
Mom had made her first journey in Greece from Piraeus in 1980 when she travelled solo, flying to Athens and then getting a ferry to Rhodes. She loved Piraeus and the bustle of getting on and off ferries, so I was pretty sure she had had some influence on these plans. She was going to get her last bit of island hopping in before settling on Santorini.
A twitter friend recommended accommodation in Santorini. What a find! Affordable, comfortable and the owners, Katerina and Nectarios treated us like family rather than guests. And Katerina is a fantastic baker. We didn’t want to leave.
Santorini has an reputation for being expensive, and yes there are some places that are eye wateringly pricey, yet it is still possible to visit and enjoy Santorini on a modest budget.
We were based in Fira, the capital, but I had an inkling that it was Oia that Mom had stayed in, so we took the bus there with Mom in the back pack.
Oia is stunning. I had seen countless photographs and was worried that it would not live up to my expectations. It exceeded them. And I knew this is where Mom was meant to be.
We got away from the crowds and searched for the perfect place. And found it.
Mom wasn’t religious yet I thought being in front of a tiny church was appropriate.
And this field of daisies just seemed to be the right place.
This is the view.
And I chose the right place, as after I had left her in her final resting place, although off the main drag where tourists gathered, everyone who passed the field stopped to admire them and the view. So she will get plenty of visitors. She would like that.
Our first night in Greece and hit gold with the hotel, booked via Booking.com. Exhausted after a four hour flight, landing at midnight, we really thought we would need a comfortable night as at the time we had no idea what our forward travel plans would be. We were pleasantly surprised to be put in to an only just finished fully refurbished room at Kastro Hotel.
Until we could see what ferries were running to Santorini we could not book ahead any further, and sadly we could only get one night here, when our plans to go to the Cyclades straight away were thwarted by the fact that there are no ferries there until the 17 April. We fly home at 1am on the 18th.
As the primary reason for this trip to Greece is to fulfil the wishes of my mom, which was to have her ashes scattered in Santorini, we knew we had to come up with a plan.
So far, everything about this trip had gone so well. The cost of the flights dropped by £80. We were first through passport control at Crete which has never happened ever. There were no queues at Birmingham airport check in or security. We had left before all the hold ups in traffic around the airport. My hand luggage was not searched and swabbed as it has been done on the last three times departing from a UKairport. And we score this hotel.
I knew there had to be a solution, as there was no way that the islands would be complete cut off from, and here is the lightbulb moment, from the mainland. Of course, Piraeus.
Long story, cut short, we are going to Santorini, via Athens. Which has had a huge impact on our budget. The upside, is we get to Athens and visit The Parthenon.
This trip is really turning into my 1979 holiday, re visited. More expensive of course, but totally worth it.
We have had to move hotel, not so lush but overlooking the sea and 10 minutes from the ferry terminal. We sail overnight on 13 April, to Piraeus, tourist class, just like I did in 1979. I have booked one night in an hotel costing €30 and then we sail to Santorini on 14th, returning on the very first fast ferry to Heraklion on 17th at 8pm. I only hope it all goes to plan, as we have a plane to catch 5 hours later.
One t shirt, one pair of shorts, one dress, two pairs of linen trousers, two favourite holiday tops and one cover up/sleep wear. Rolled and ready.
Into a packing cube. Undies, socks, swimwear and sarong in another.
Add a cardie and into the bag they go.
Sandals, travel towel and silk sleeping bag liner tucked around the packing cubes.
This is all I am taking
Toiletries and SPF 50 hat
Healthy Back Bag
Add toiletries, hat and bag for the day time. This is my second Healthy Back Bag, with lots of handy compartments and is big enough for an iPad, sunglasses, notebook and pens, all safely tucked away and organised.
iPad, scarf, kag in abag
Book, sunglasses, make up and camera
Kindle, phone and adaptors
These will go in hand luggage, also in packing cubes. Minimalist make up as you can see. New on my Kindle is a book by Dave Dean, Hammocks and Hardrives, The Tech Guide for Digital Nomads. I live in hope. Seriously though, Dave was a great help to me when planning my RTW trip and I would suggest if you are serious about travelling and being a digital nomad, he is the man!
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Same routine for the husband. Seven shirts/t shirts, one pair of shorts and one pair of cargo pants, plus sandals, towel and sleeping bag liner. I even managed to get an additional warm top in for us both.
Weight of case fully packed? 10 kg each and hand luggage 3 kg each, that is pretty good going I reckon. And if were not for silly Thomson airline rules we could carry this on with us. The only thing we would do different is buy shampoo or shower gel at the airport or destination.
Crete, Santorini and who knows where else, here we come.
When preparing to travel, lay out all your clothes and all your money. Then take half the clothes and twice the money. ~Susan Heller The money is fixed at £500 plus flights for 7 nights backpacking around the Greek Islands. The flights to Crete are booked and one night at the Kastro Hotel is reserved via Booking.Com and both were well within the budget. I just hope we manage to find some equally good bargains on rooms in Santorini and wherever else we visit. Packing, that is a different matter. We saw these UPPTÄCKA backpacks at Ikea and bought them because they have wheels too. When we used rucksacks on our RTW trip we so rarely needed to haul them on our backs and I really struggled with carrying my pack even though it weighed less than 10kg. I guess I am less a backpacker and more a flashpacker and at 55 I have nothing to prove.
Packing cubes for small items
Ikea Packing Cubes in Pink
Ikea Packing Cubes in Blue
I am also a convert to packing cubes. The pink and blues ones are also from Ikea. No hunting at the bottom of the bag for undies or socks. And full, they all fit perfectly into the larger rucksack. I have found these on the left purchased at Lakeland so useful, keeping cables, adapters and plugs all in one place, combined with these adaptor wraps, also from Lakeland. These certainly help me not to leave any adaptor plugged in at a hostel or hotel. And when, inevitably I have to unload my hand luggage to be searched at airport security. We also need to be prepared for cooler evenings as Greece in April can be chilly, yet if we are hopping on and off ferries I don’t want to be lugging a heavy coat on a warm day. My trusty Kag in a Bag combined with a warm top will have to suffice. One pair of shoes to travel in and one pair of sandals. And that is it. It all has to fit into these two rucksacks, one to check and one as carry on. If I could only take one carry on that would be ideal, however the airline we are travelling with have a 5kg limit for hand luggage. We had to pay £48 for each bag we check, and have an allowance of 20 kg per bag. The 20 kg cannot be split over two bags, you pay for the bag not the weight. Who needs 20 kg for a week in Greece? Reluctantly I paid for two bags on top of the flights. The fact that the flights dropped in price by £40 the day I booked somewhat softened the blow. Still Thomsons, it is a silly policy. The bulkiest and heaviest items (apart from shoes) are toiletries. I keep saying we will cut back, and always struggle to do so. I have bought a 3 in 1 shower/shampoo/conditioner, I use hardly any make up and have had my hair cut in an easy to manage style (thanks Vangelis) as I am definitely not taking hair dryers and straighteners. Maybe one hair product to project it from the sun. Sun lotion, toothpaste, Eight Hour Cream and Bare Minerals Sunscreen and that is all. Did me for 5 months on the RTW trip, will certainly do for 7 days in Greece. I am packing and flying tomorrow, wish me luck. And please feel free to share your packing tips with me.
After I had published my last post about Greece, a number of other memories from that trip in 1979 popped into my head. Amazing that after 35 years I can recall so much. some of the photos jog the memory, like this one that reminds me that the van broke down a lot.
As my travel companion commented on my Facebook Page, it was indeed a great holiday. We travelled with a company called Consolas Travel who amazingly are still in business. I say amazingly because I am surprised any of their drivers survived more than one trip, their driving was so atrocious.
They got lost, a lot. Most memorably in Paris. They had no business being in Paris as we were heading for Boulogne sur Mer for the ferry back to Dover. They were following road signs for Bois de Boulogne. We spent an hour driving around Paris looking for the port.
Eventually they decided to ask for directions. Greek drivers in Paris asking for directions. Words that never belong together on one page. They were of the belief that if they shouted in Greek, Parisians would understand them. Arms were waved, by both the French and the Greeks. One passenger made the attempt to interrupt but they were having nothing of it, until she pushed her way off the bus, and asked for directions in perfect French.
She then directed the Greek drivers out of Paris and to the port. Where our ferry was departing.
We were just grateful to be alive never mind in the right Boulogne, as these particular drivers didn’t stop the coach when they switched over. Yup, one guy kept his foot on the pedal, the other took the steering wheel and as one slid out of the drivers seat, the other slipped in.
When we had left Athens we spent all our last Drachma on food and drink for the journey home. We bought bread and tinned sardines. The reason I remember this was because we shared our food around the coach, as many of our fellow travellers had no money left at all. We didn’t quite feed the 500, but our loaves and fishes sure went a long way around that bus.
When we stopped in Venice we were penniless. Beautiful city, and everyone was diving into ice cream except for us. Yet generosity has a habit of being paid forward, and one of the passengers bought us an ice cream each.
Before departing from Omonia Square we spent a last day in Athens. The bus left early in the morning so we needed somewhere close by that was cheap to stay the night. John the Kiwi was travelling back with us, so it made sense to get a room for the three of us to cut costs. Five of us had spent many nights in one room, on one beach, in one VW, so we thought nothing of it. It was cheap, but not very clean. It was for one night and all we could afford.
It was only after checking in, and hearing rats scuttling around the room did we realise how dirty the place was. What we also didn’t realise, till much later, was that most people rented the rooms by the hour. We were slap bang in a red light district and most of the rooms were occupied by prostitutes and their clients. We had no guide book or internet, we had no idea. We did emerge unscathed, if unwashed and itchy. Think hovering over the loo, careful not to let anything touch you anywhere.
Despite sleeping with prostitutes and rats, that trip to Greece is so memorable. I can still see the sun setting in the middle of the bay, in Matala Crete. That night we slept without a tent, with the Milky Way as our roof. I have no photos of that, indeed much of the holiday is not recorded on film. I have 38 photographs from a trip that lasted about three weeks. I can take that many in a day now, but then film was expensive to buy and develop, when the film ran out so did the photos.
Another memory was of the time we spent in Athens on a camp site we didn’t pay for. The banks were on strike and non of us had any cash. We couldn’t put fuel in the van and had no money for food. rob drove on the camp site, and we were told it was full, so we told them we would just turn around and leave. Instead we kept on until we found a spot that we could squeeze into. It was right on a beach and we spent the day swimming and sunning.
Back in those pre recycling days, you got money back on empty bottles. We needed cash and people had left empty bottles on the beach. So we collected them and exchanged them for a few Drachma. And that is how we survived for a couple of days until the banks re opened. Dropping of Ellie to stay with her ex in Athens, we had already lost Cathy to a holiday romance, the four of us decided to visit Crete.I don’t think I will be visiting Knossos or seeing much of Crete this time. Strikes and weather permitting, I will be going to some islands I have never been to before, The Cyclades. Can you tell I am looking forward to it?
I first travelled to Greece in 1979. There were four of us travelling overland on a bus from London to Athens.
The not so trusty VW with me and The Kiwi
Sara, my uni friend, and I had been working the summer at The Avon Gorge Hotel. It was rather a good summer job, as bar jobs go. My tips paid the rent, I had free food from the hotel, so with no other expenses, my wages paid for the trip to Greece.
Our customers were a good mix of locals who tipped well, hotel guests visiting Bristol for business or pleasure and a weekly coach load of Americans who were doing Europe in a week, (think, If It’s Tuesday This Must Be Belgium). One of them thought the Clifton Suspension Bridge was a copy of The Golden Gate in San Francisco. That is a true story, I promise you.
We even had the Kent County Cricket Team stay once. Amazing how a logo on a polo shirt can get you into every club in Bristol for free. But that is another story and this post is not about Bristol or a night on the town with cricketers. It is about Greece.
L to R Rob Ross, Ellie Ross, Cath, me, and out of shot, the Kiwi
My ex boyfriend had travelled to Greece the summer before with a guy named Rob. It was he who suggested I go to Greece and hooked up with Rob and his VW van. I suggested it to my uni friend and she was keen. We mentioned it to another girl who was working the bar with us, and she decided to come along too. We had also got friendly with one of the receptionists, Ellie Ross. Amazingly she was also working at the hotel to pay for her trip to Greece. Then we discovered that Rob, the man with the van, was her brother.
Me, Rob and Cath at Corinth Canal
The overland journey by bus was pretty awful. I have recollections of travelling though the former Yugoslavia, where old ladies increased the charge to use unuseable loos when they realised they had a coach full of Brits. Being confused that we were not getting served with food and found out that was because we asked for the menu. And I am pretty sure we left one passenger stranded in Zagreb.
The highlights, for me, were travelling through The Mont Blanc Tunnel, and seeing the Geneva Water Fountain. The fountain was always shown in the 60s tv show The Champions. I also recall rather good food being served, with wine, at a French motorway service area. Coming from England, good food is not what we associate with a motorway cafe. Certailnly not in the 70’s. That is why we used to take flasks and sandwiches and picnic on the verge of the M1. And wine, while driving?
We arrived in Athens and Ellie took us on the train to stay the night with the family of her ex boyfriend. In Kifisia. I am not sure that we had known then she had a boyfriend or where we were going to stay that night, we just let Rob and Ellie take the lead as they seemed to know what they were doing. Kifisia is the last stop, and is a leafy and affluent suburb. Water sprinlers kept the manicured lawns perfect. Chilled water was kept in Gordon’s Gin bottles in the fridge. The decor was sumptuous. One night of luxury.
Ellie and Rob
Anthony, her ex, and Ellie had met in England at University. His mother was English and his father was Greek. They had met as spies during the war. He was now something very important in the government. And I was staying in their house. That night the family and friends took us swimming off the rocks and afterwards for dinner in the hills. And that is when my love affair with Greece began.
I recall piles of food coming out, Greek Salad, lamb chops, chicken and potatoes, retsina flowing and wondering how I would be able to afford this. The bill, once split came to about £1.
The next day, Rob came and picked us up in the ancient VW. He had one other passenger, John, from New Zealand. We camped in Athens and went to the Wine Festival. Nursing hangovers from hell the next day we set off around the mainland, visiting The Acropolis, the Corinth Canal and Mycenae. For someone who had studied and loved Classical Studies this was a dream come true.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
One night we went to see The Trojan Women in a Greek Ampitheatre. I had studied the play at school and now I was watching it in Greek, in Greece. Afterwards we went to a taverna that was full of young men who were in the army on on Naitonal Service. They kept sending wine to our table. We later set off to the beach to camp for the night. Someone decided we would have a disco in the van. We got sort of arrested, a long night at the police station ensued. Only after a lot of waving of arms and shouting did Anthony and his sister mention who their father was. We were then allowed to leave. We were woken in the morning by the fishermen whose boats we had slept in.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
After a more peaceful nights camping we left the van and took the foot ferry over to Aegina and Spetes.
Rob then decided to go to Piraeus and see where we could go from there. By then we were all so laid back we had decided that we were only allowed to make three decisions a day between us. Cathy had decided to run of with a Greek man after Spetses, so it was just the five of us who decided to go to Crete.
This slideshow requires JavaScript.
Again, how excited was I to be visiting Knossos.
Knossos
Things I had read about at school, now I was actually there.
Campsite in Crete
We camped here just outside Agios Nikolaos. When I returned to Crete in the 90’s all this had been built on. Five star hotels stealing the views.
But all things had to come to an end, and we had to say goodbye to Crete.
This was the last day, just outside Heraklion, making the most of the beach.
OMG was I that brown and thin?
And waited in the shade for the ferry back to the mainland.
Snoozing
I am going back to Crete next week. The flight is booked and one night in Heraklion. Then it is off to the port, to get a ferry and make only three decisions a day. One will be to go to Santorini to keep the last promise I made to my mom. To reunite her with her friend the wind.
Mine was on the ferry from Piraeus to Crete. It was 1979, the end of my second year at uni, and I was travelling with Sara, Rob and Elli in a camper van though Greece. On a whim, or because it was the first ferry to sail, we decided to go to Crete.
The signs indicating the location of lifeboats were in French and English and the walls were decorated with views of the White Cliffs of Dover on this former English Channel ferry. Yet there was no doubt we were in Greece, surrounded, as we were, by extended Greek families with their belongings wrapped in colourful blankets, tied up like a sack. Old men smoked their strong cigarettes, older women with headscarves slept on their makeshift sacks and children played games on the deck. I didn’t see a goat but it wouldn’t have surprised me if I had.
We were travelling deck class. I was contentedly cocooned by all this hustle and bustle, the shouted conversations, the clatter of the backgammon games, the welcome gentle breeze after the heat of the day, the prospect of sleeping on deck under the stars. I didn’t think it could get any better. And then I found my moussaka.
We had descended into the chaotic deck class canteen, heaving with hungry travellers. Burly chefs guarded the food in giant catering tins, with ladles as weapons, to beat us off if we didn’t take it in turn. It was a scene reminiscent of an old school dining hall, hungry children queuing for food while dinner ladies kept us in line. Except in Greece there is no such thing as an orderly queue.
The moussaka was divided into huge portions. Meat sauce, rich with tomatoes and onions, interweaved the towers of aubergines and potatoes, held firmly together by a thick white sauce. A savoury layer cake, glistening in olive oil. I pushed my way to the front of the gesticulating crowd, caught the eye of one of the cooks, pointed at the moussaka and thrust a few thousand drachmas into his hand to seal the deal.
Moussaka. It’s as if all the food and flavours of Greece have collided in one dish. Giant red tomatoes, ripened in the sun, deep purple aubergines, lamb combined with cinnamon, fresh oregano, custardy béchamel sauce, made with Greek yoghurt and fresh eggs, left to cook slowly all day, then cooled so it could be cut into slabs. And this moussaka had been cooking long enough for all the spices, herbs, tomatoes and olive oil to meld together; the taste of Greece in one delicious mouthful. My senses were bombarded, and Alice in Wonderland like, the moussaka said, ‘Eat Me!’
I’d been in Greece for about two weeks and had got used to lukewarm Greek food. I had discovered salads bursting with flavour, sprinkled with salty feta cheese; so unlike the English limp lettuce Sunday tea salads. Yoghurt and honey for breakfast, enormous juicy melons and apricots, souvlaki, retsina and Fix beers.
I had enjoyed meals in taverns on the beach and high in the mountains. Food was good, plentiful and cheap. Yet this moment has stayed with me. I can still smell the aroma of herbs and spices, can still see the olive oil seeping out of the sauce, and recall the taste of my very first moussaka.
This is my first attempt at blogging and I am learning to do this as I plan to embark on a round the world trip.
I have always considered myself as a traveller rather than a holidaymaker but in reality I have mostly done package holidays. Except when I took my 3 year old daughter back packing around the Greek Islands way back in the 80’s and before that overland to Greece on a bus, back in 1979, which is when my love affair with Greece began.
One of my companions on that first trip to Greece was Sara, who I studied with at, what was then, Bristol Polytechnic. She has been the catalyst for this round the world trip as she now lives in Melbourne. So thank you Sara for getting me off my backside and finally booking this once in a lifetime experience.
I don’t start the trip till October 16th but plan to practice blogging in the meantime, uploading photos etc, so that when I embark on the trip I will know a bit more to make this blog worthwhile for the writer and the reader.
travellingcoral 