<XMP><body> </xmp> Newsletter The Greek Islands December 2008

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NEWSLETTER THE GREEK ISLANDS - NIEUWSBRIEF DE GRIEKSE EILANDEN
Back from Crete and been very busy.
Hello lovers of the Greek islands, here is the update of my website The Greek Islands. If you have received this newsletter by mistake or if you want to unsubscribe please reply to this email and write "unsubscribe" in the subjectmatter.

Uitzicht Villa Pantazis, view Villa Pantazis. Sikologos zuid Kreta, Sikologos southern Crete
Sorry for taking so long, there was so much work to do.
First of all I have to apologize for taking so long to send out the new newsletter, but I have been working on my Cretan pages eversince I came back two months ago. It is now in the air and I am really proud of it. I have made a few changes, for instance there is now a small map of Crete that goes with each village or beach so you can quickly see in which part of Crete it is situated in case you want to visit. I have also put on much more information for some of the old places (for instance Chania, Agia Pelagia, Rethimnon) plus city maps, sights to be seen etcetera. And last but not least I have integrated the new villages and beaches in the old page and uploaded a lot of new pictures and stories. There are new restaurants and hotels on the website and even a new island (Gramvousa, a satelite island in the west of Crete). So as you might understand I have done a lot of work hoping to one day have the most beautiful website about Crete. Below I start with the pictures of the places where we have stayed from the beginning to the end. As you can see my travel companion is wearing the same shirt on day one as he is wearing on day 21 and I honestly don't remember if he changed his outfit during our holiday, ahah. Oh no...it is a different color, so I gues it is one of those "buy two, pay one" kind of shirts...
Hotel Appartementen Zorbas, Agia Pelagia, Kreta Sophia's House, Villa in Crete, Almirida, Kreta Villa Aetos Vigla, Milatos, Crete Villa Pantazis, Madaros, Rethimnon, Crete Villa Pantazis, Madaros, Rethimnon, Crete
Old Fountain Villas, Galatas, Chania, Crete Villa Lambros, Tertsa, Mirtos, Crete Tania Apartments in Crete Villa Renata, Megala Chorafia, Apokoronas, Chania, Crete Irini Apartments, Agia Pelagia, Crete
The places where we stayed.
We started our trip as usual in Agia Pelagia, which is not far from the capital Heraklion and the airport. We had a late flight (unfortunately) and arrived at around 22.00 o'clock in the evening. First we picked up our car at Just Rentals (someone was waiting for us at the exit of the building with a sign and a big smile) and then went to Zorbas Apartments, which is one of the two places in this village where we usually stay. Than we had a quick dinner and saw our friends at the Irini restaurant (which is next door to Zorbas). Their food is the best in the village and we sometimes also rent an aparment with them. We heard that they were going to close in 2009 because of a raise in rent in 2009. We're not talking a few bucks, but they had to pay 13.000 euro extra the next year in order to rent their building with the restaurant and 6 apartments. After two days we went to a place called Aspro, which is in the Apokoronas, close to the seaside resort Almirida. We had rented a villa there for three days. It was so good nobody wanted to leave anymore and I think I cooked at home every evening. During the daytime we visited some villages in the neighbourhood, like the beautiful Argiroupoli and of course Almirida and the beach. The weather started to change a bit and some parts of the days it would be cloudy. When our three days in Aspro were over we left for Milatos where we had rented an enormous villa, only for two days (yeah sorry people, I sound like a millionaire and I am not, but at least I felt a bit like one on my holiday, ahah). During our stay it remained cloudy and we even had some rain. In Milatos we visited the Milatos cave, but I forgot to bring a flashlight and my glasses dropped out of my pants and were on the floor of the car while I was at the cave, so not a 100% succesful visit :). When our stay at Milatos was over this was also the end of the first week and one of us had to go home (there were three of us in the beginning). When we drove to the airport it was raining cats and dogs you couldn't see a thing on the road. The only thing we saw were cars that crashed into eachother and ambulances that rushed by. We left our friend at the airport and drove to our next destination, Villa Pantazis in Madaros (near Rethimnon and Episkopi Beach). It is a beautiful stone house. We were greeted by the owner and her son and we were treated to a meal and a few shots of raki (a traditional drink and we needed that after all this rain). The villa was amazing and the most beautiful house that I have ever seen in Crete or anywhere else. We spend our time mainly on the beach, took a dip into the sea and looked at the birds that walked around in the sand (yes: we had some sun again every now and then!) and looked at some of the small villages in the area. It was sad to say goodbye to such a beautiful place but the next stop was no punishment as well. We went to a villa close to Chania near to the village of Galatas. We had some busy days here visiting friends and on our first morning we went on a boat trip to the island of Gramvousa. The next day we visited some friends of ours that live in a small mountain village just above Kisamos and that run a small but beautiful accommodation there. They had prepaired all kinds of delicious snacks and since the sun was shining I also took a dip in their swimming pool. It turned out to be of the nicest days of the holiday.
A look from the other side of Agia Pelagia towards Ligaria. The village of Aspro, Sophia's House, Villa in Crete, Almirida, Kreta Milatos and Sisi beaches, Crete Episkopi beach, Madaros, Rethimnon, Crete Palia Vrisi, Galatas, Chania, Crete
Crete, Tertsa Agia Fotia, Kreta, Crete Crete, Tertsa Chania, Kreta, Crete Agia Pelagia Crete, Kreta
After four days in Galatas we had to leave our beautiful villa and we had to get up early in the morning to go all the way to the south / southeast of the island, which is a long journey. We had to go to a remote village called Tertsa. It turned out to be a beautiful quiet village and I loved the beaches: there are so many of them and they were very quiet, and some parts were also used by naturists (meaning: us). When we arrived somewhere against the end of the afternoon it was very windy and the waves were high (this was going to be better the next couple of days). We stayed in an apartment in Villa Lambros for four days but we made a small detour for one day to stay with our (now) friends in the nearby village of Ferma. We love the beach here as well: unspoilt, quiet and good for naturists as well. Just like our beloved Xerokampos where we also made a stop in order to dive into the sea. We went out with Loes and Peter that run Tania Apartments in Ferma and had a splendid day relaxing and finishing it off with some great food and great company. We stayed in a studio in one of their bungalows and enjoyed a wonderful breakfast here, kissed goodbye and we were off again. The holiday was coming to an end almost now when we headed back to the Apokoronas again. After a delay in Rethimnon in order to pay for a speeding ticket we arrived in Megala Chorafia for our two days in Villa Renata. The villa was beautiful and the pool was beautiful but the weather was not. I took one short dip into the water but most of the time we spent driving around the area, looking at the high waves of the sea and also we made a visit to Chania, which was really nice. Then it was time for the grande finale and we had to go back to Agia Pelagia for the last two days of our September-October visit to Crete. This time we stayed with our friends at Irini. It was very nice but also very sad knowing that it would be the last time we would be there since they are going to close in 2009. The weather didn't change and again we had lots of clouds, wind and even some rain. We spend most of our time driving around the island and we visited some villages, like for instance Anogia, which looks really sad when it is raining and it is all wet, especially when you have your friends in Holland on the telephone and they are eating pancakes at the beach at the same time you are walking around in a wet t-shirt in Crete.
Balos Beach, Crete Balos Beach, Crete Etia, Sitia, Crete, Kreta Gramvousa Agios Nikolaos, Crete, Kreta
Sikologos, Tertsa, Mirtos, Crete Vatos, Mirtos, Kreta, Crete Almirida, Crete, Kreta Makrigialos, Kreta, Crete Me in Agios Nikolaos.
The day after we returned home the sun came back in the island of Crete. So don't worry my friends in Crete we will return! This kind of weather with so many bad days at a stretch is quite exceptional and it has never happened to us before. I gues we were just unlucky this time. I will spend the coming months dreaming about the next island I will go to and I will be making plans. Samos and Patmos are still high on the list but we are also thinking about going back to the Cyclades to see our old friends on islands like Mykonos, Tinos, Paros and Antiparos. Anyways... I want to thank everybody for the attention and I want to take the opportunity to already wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Maybe we will bump into eachother some day somewhere on a Greek island. I will start asking around at the hotels on my website and write to my friends to see if they can make me a special offer again to put on only my website, and I will put that in the next newsletter.
Here is the website about Crete. Hugs, Hans the Greek Islands.

Hans Huisman www.angelfire.com/super2/greece 2008

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