Greece

Athens confounded me. We almost switched our itinerary to avoid Greece due to the “riots.” And I heard that the port in itself was nothing special. I imagined a lot of old Greek ruins and hills covered with blue-roofed villas. What I got in Athens instead was a completely normal big city. The first day, a few friends and I took a cab to the Acropolis to see the Parthenon. We got there around sunset and got some awesome views; the place definitely lives up to its reputation as a must-see destination.

After seeing the Acropolis and wandering around downtown Athens for a couple hours, I couldn’t help myself. We found out about a nearby outdoor movie theater playing Harry Potter 7, part 2 in English. The theater was serving beer and wine and was in an outdoor courtyard. I will spare you the movie review, because that’s not why I’m on this trip, but I will just ask where you saw HP7 this summer?

The next morning, I got on an early ferry to the island of Mykonos. Five other guys and I had rented a room in a hotel around May. When we got there, the owner at the reception desk found our reservation and looked up at my friend Will who organized the whole thing and said in broken English “ooh you have the BEST one!” Well…she wasn’t kidding! For 58 euro each, we had two nights and three days in Mykonos in a 2-story room with two separate balconies right next to the hotel pool, overlooking beaches and harbors and more beautiful white Greek buildings in the distance.

Our first day in Mykonos, we walked along the coastline until we got to Paradise Beach. That place is essentially a club 24/7 and was a ton of fun until we went back to the hotel around midnight. The second day, we met up with some friends who had an amazing villa right above Super Paradise Beach (yes, that’s different than plain old Paradise Beach). It also had a really cool club and a nice beach to its name.

On the last day, we had to pack up and go back toward the airport to get back to Athens. But to kill time before the flight, we walked around the little downtown area which was absolutely amazing. Cobblestone streets, tiny alleyways, tons of shops and lots of locals filled our day, as well as a few more delicious gyro meals. Those gyros are definitely the best local food I’ve had on this trip so far!

We got back to the port later that night and tore up a local karaoke bar (and we found a cool hole-in-the-wall place called Bar Kit Kat). That turned out to be our last hurrah in Greece, since everyone used the first half of debarkation day to recover from the previous four. All in all, Greece was really cool. Especially the time spent in Mykonos. I’ll definitely be going back there to hit up Santorini and spend some more time in Athens!