Goodbye Greece

Following our departure from Rhodes we heading to the mainland, and went south to the area known as Peleponesos. We first visited Nafplia, which I read was the first capital of Greece. There was this massive castle on the hill overlooking the town and the coastline which was well worth the steep walk up the side of the mountain. We ended up staying in Nafplia for 4 nights, as we loved being able to cook for ourselves for the frst time in ages. It was a beautiful town, and definitely had a venetian feel to it.


After Nafplia we made a pilgrimage to Ancient Olympia to visit the site of the original Olympic Games. Although it was actually a really small town, there was a ridiculous amount of accommodation which was pretty cheap compared to other places we have been and is surrounded by beautiful hills with trees, something that can't be said for some of the islands (particularly those in the Cyclades group). The site of the Olympics was fantastic and we managed to find the exact place where the flame is lit each Olympiad. We also managed to have a run on the old dirt stadium. Olympia itself was pretty cheap and we tracked down some really good homestyle food, which was a welcome change from everything being fried in olive oil.


I can definitely recommend a visit to both of these towns (and the Peleponesos), and it was so nice to see trees again.

Although the mention of Greece conjures images of white deserted beaches, beautiful views over the oceans, fantastic food and welcoming hospitality, unfortunately this is not reality, well at least not from our experiences anyway. Don't get me wrong, at certain times you may and probably will find any or each of these things, however these times are not as frequent as you might expect.

We saw some absolutely beautiful places such as parts of Naxos, the cliffs of Santorini, the Dodecanese islands of Kos and Rhodes, the Peleponesos and parts of northern Greece and met some really nice genuine people who were interesting and welcoming. Unfortunately the more attention I paid to things and the more Greek I learnt the more I came to realise that we were being conned, scammed or ripped off under the guise of good hospitality most of the time. While Greece once had a reputation for being reasonably cheap, that is all but a memory. They are very generous in rounding up (one restaurant owner did me a 'favour' by rounding EU$17.80 up to an even EU$20), and demanding tips for appalling 'service' (the waiters with cigarettes). Occasionally something was well priced, but that was an oddity...I even noticed a big difference from when I was here 2 years ago.

While we've seen some nice places and met some people, I think I've had about enough of the Greeks for the moment.