A Break From Dagobert

We stopped by the ancient theater of Epidavros on the way down to the jumping off point for the islands. What the heck, I guess we can detour 10km to see the largest, best preserved, and most impressive of the 2300 year-old Greek amphitheaters. The acoustic qualities are amazing. You can hear a person speaking from the center of the stage all the way up in the cheap seats. Allie and Noelle sang part of "This Land is Your Land" to the delight of some Spanish and German tourists.




Afterwards we continued south and camped near the port of Ermioni, where we would catch a boat to the island of Hydra the next day. Our campsite was desolate, lonely, and seemed to be winding down for the season. We swam in the Saronic Gulf since there wasn't a pool in sight.

The next morning we caught the hydrofoil over to Hydra and sadly left Dagobert behind in the port parking lot. Hydra is a very dry and rocky isle, it looks like the top part of Reno's Peavine Mountain poking out of the sea. The town has to catch rainwater in cisterns and have domestic water shipped from the mainland. It sounds awful but the little harbor town of Hydra is amazing, with narrow cobbled footpaths winding between whitewashed houses. There are no cars or scooters on Hydra so young men pulling handcarts or donkeys handle the transportation duties. Despite all the logistical challenges of getting supplies, we had the best and cheapest dinner in all of our Greek travels so far.


Hydra survives on tourists but is unspoiled by them. The locals seem friendly and sincere. We were met at the port by an old man who asked if we were looking for a room. He showed us up to a great room in his hotel overlooking the port and best of all it was about a third of the price that we had budgeted for. Jolene and I have been lucky in our travels and have mostly found great places to stay by flying by the seat of our pants and not making reservations. This does fail occasionally as I think of my first trip to Europe, spending a soggy night underneath an overhanging boulder in a Munich park. How was a young American supposed to know that Octoberfest is actually the end of September?




We could really get used to this island lifestyle. Everything we need is within a minute's walk of the hotel. The kids love to explore and they are more than happy to fetch olives or breakfast supplies for us.







The island is covered in cats. Noelle loves them as do most of the tourists. At least there are no mice!



Today we hiked along the coast until we saw a nice swimming beach, jumped in the water, made a picnic, then hiked some more. Great artists and writers have found inspiration on the Greek isles so we are expecting great things.




I'm continually amazed that even in cities that are heavily visited by tourists you can simply walk a few blocks off the main streets and find a genuine experience. The running joke of the trip has been that every new town we visit becomes Jolene's favorite. I think that I may be taking the ferry back to Dagobert alone.