Greece 2011, Antiparos

The hotel Kastro was excellent, we had stayed there before and had requested the same room but the owner insisted on upgrading us at no extra cost to a superior room and we were not going to argue with that!

In the morning we had an excellent breakfast under a gazebo in the garden where we planned a leisurely day in and around the village and the beaches.

We walked down what I suppose was the main street with plastic bollards to stop vehicles passing but which delivery vehicles simply ignored and drove straight over anyway, past quaint old mini-markets and twisting streets running in every direction and local women sitting chatting to their neighbours in front of the doors to their houses as they have done forever.

The main town of Kastro is a traditional Cycladic settlement, full of whitewashed cubic houses with little flowered balconies and blue painted doors and windows. My favourite doors are in the Cyclades where, next to the white that we all associate with the islands, the prevailing colour is blue. It turns out that the widespread use emanates from an ancient belief that the sky-blue shade of turquoise has the power to keep evil away. It is believed that the radiation of the colour composes a sort of invisible shield, which prevents the approach of bad spirits. Blue is used everywhere in the Cyclades, church cupolas, windows, doors, walls, staircases, fences and also as blue ‘belts’ around buildings, which supposedly provide protection against evil.

The road took us down to the harbour and we walked around it and to a gritty beach that was lined with armirikia trees with whitewashed trunks that provided welcome shade from the hot sun and we sat for a while and dangled our feet in the cool water. About an hour on a beach is more than long enough for me so just before boredom clicked in we left and wandered back to the village along the harbour side where there was a sudden frenzy of excitement when a fisherman landed a huge fish and set about gutting it and preparing it for the dinner table there and then by the side of the road.

On the way back we visited the ancient kastro that has a quaint but neglected mix of houses, some inhabited but others abandoned and crying out for refurbishment. There were some little shops and a folk lore museum that didn’t take long to look around and by mid morning it was time for a first mythos of the day and after that we ambled back to the hotel for a swim in the pool and a drink on the terrace. The terrace was blue of course with tubs of neglected geraniums, a crooked olive tree and pink bougainvillea tumbling down from overhead trellising.

While we sat and read our books on the balcony of the room the only thing to disturb us was the constant calling of the cicadas which are at their most noisy in the heat of the day. Apparently a single insect can achieve a sound level of one hundred and twenty decibels which is the equivalent of a pneumatic drill or a chain saw which is a very impressive ratio of sound to body weight. A human shouting like that would probably sound like Krakatoa erupting and the only man who can get remotely close to this is Brian Blessed.

There was happy hour at the poolside so before we went out in the evening we took advantage of that and after the sun disappeared walked all the way back down to the harbour, which was busy again. In the morning the little town seemed to have an end of season quietness about it but by the evening it had really livened up and restaurants, tavernas and chic boutiques had all opened their doors for business and the main street had a sense of vitality about it.

Anti-Paros felt very cosmopolitan and with no riff-raff about it felt just a little bit special. We poked around the shops but I have to admit that I do not have the same amount of enthusiasm as Kim for sparkly things on chains, baby clothes or sun tops and so quickly became bored. Kim sensed this of course and so we moved on and found a seat at the same taverna on account of the fact that we had really enjoyed it there the night before.



Greece 2011, Paros and Paroikia Old Town

Kim woke early this morning and did her best to invite me to join her in a state of consciousness by banging doors, turning the lights on, opening the blue shutters to let the screaming sunlight inside the room and by using the hair dryer! Although I was vaguely aware of some of this anti-social activity I resisted the move from slumber to wakefulness and in the end she conceded defeat and went for a walk by herself along to the beach. I woke an hour or so later and found her wandering along the seashore enjoying the early morning sunshine.

After breakfast in the hotel we walked the short distance to Paroikia past a row of gaily coloured fishing boats where leather skinned men with gnarled and calloused hands and smelling unashamedly of sea creatures were rearranging nets, carrying out repairs and sorting through the remains of the previous night’s catch, the best of it long gone to the restaurant owners who had been here much earlier and only tiddlers and odd looking scraps left now which were being picked over and were destined either for the fishermen’s grilled lunch or rejection and disposal back into the sea.

It’s a sad fact that we have always previously neglected Paros, being a busy ferry hub this has always been a place to rush through on the way to somewhere else so today it was time to put that right and give the place the courtesy of a proper visit and behind the untidy ribbon of harbour front fast food bars, travel agents and car hire offices we slipped into the tiny streets of the timeless old town. Here there was an eclectic mix of modern chic boutiques, old fashioned mini markets and the inevitable tourist shops (actually, a few more shops than I am generally comfortable with, I have to say) rubbing shoulders with blue domed churches, Venetian villas in various stages of neglect and restoration, bars and a Kastro.

The narrow cobbled streets invited exploration and as we walked around some led to surprises and others led to nowhere in particular but all around were white washed walls, blue doors and fences and fading menu boards and the place was filled with the familiar smells of the Greek Islands, heavy incense from behind the church doors, fresh moussaka from the tavernas and Tide washing powder spilling out through the doors and windows of the houses where people went about their daily chores.

Eventually we left the old town and emerged in a large square with one of the most important churches in all of Greece, the fourth century Panagia Ekatontapyliani, which means Our Lady of a Hundred Doors, and is the oldest remaining Byzantine church in Greece. According to legend, ninety-nine doors have been found in the church so far and the hundredth will be discovered only after Constantinople is Greek again. This church was unusually welcoming to inappropriately dressed tourists insisting only that they behave with respect and keep their voices down.

We duly noted this and went through the heavy doors into an alternative world of black robed beardy priests, local worshippers and travelling pilgrims all lining up to kiss the lavish icons of their favourite Saints. Outside and around the church there were old fashioned stores selling various cards each with a picture of a part of the body. If you have a bad leg then you buy a leg picture, a poorly arm an elbow picture and so on and then you take this to the Church and ask for a cure and leave it there so that God doesn’t just forget about it after you have gone and these were fastened in bunches to railings and picture frames. All of this icon kissing means quite a lot of unwanted spit and saliva of course so to deal with this, cleaning ladies with spray cleaners and dusters circulated constantly to deal with the slobber and the germs on a continuous and never ending polishing circuit of the church.

Back outside we bought ferry tickets for the next leg of our journey to Amorgos and then we set about the important business of comparing Greek salad and Mythos prices in the bars and tavernas because this is the benchmark we use when we make decisions about dining arrangements. €5 and €3 respectively seemed to about the average price so there was no inflation shock there to deal with so we selected one and spent a pleasant half an hour watching the town go about its business.

During this time it became clear that we needed to reassess our opinion of Paros. We had only really seen it as an impatient heaving mass of traffic and people that accompanies the arrival and departure of a ferry but in the intervening periods it settles down into the same soporific slumber as all of the other islands.

We liked it!