Amazing Amalfi

The Amalfi Coast. Something I would call a hidden wonder of Italy. I had never heard of it until I was looking for a new destination to travel too, but travelling along a coast full of seaside towns with colourful buildings high on cliffs sounded like a nice way to spend the next 5 days.

After a 3 hour train ride, we arrived in Salerno. We had chosen this as our first spot in the Amalfi Coast, mainly because we didn’t want to travel anymore that day. This small seaside town was exactly that, small. We walked 5 minutes from the train station down the main street and were at our hotel. Dropping our bags in our room, we headed out in search of some lunch. We had passed a burger place on the walk and decided to go back there. Now i’ve had a lot of burgers in my lifetime, but these burgers were absolutely amazing. And not too badly priced either. In fact, after an afternoon of swimming at the beach and shopping, we decided to go back there for dinner to try out another burger. Two burgers in one day, with no regrets. The next day, we were heading to Maiori, a town 5 minutes away from Amalfi, where hotels were 10x cheaper than being in Amalfi itself. We caught a bus there, and met some New Zealanders at the bus stop. Three elderly ladies that were all from the Christchurch region. We got talking to them and it was surprisingly nice hearing the accent! The bus drive to Maiori was thrilling, we were driving along the cliffs, with the windy, narrow roads where the bus drivers had to beep the horn around every corner to let oncoming traffic know we were coming. As soon as we got to our destination, another one street kinda town, we spotted our hotel straight away. All along the beach, were lounging chairs which we later found out you have to pay to sit in! We once again, left our bags at the hotel, and headed out to do what we do best. Food. We had a look around the small town, then went back to the hotel so we could spend the afternoon at the beach (which was literally on the beach) That night for dinner, we found a restaurant and had-wait for it-PASTA. The next day, we prepared ourselves for a day trip to Amalfi. We purchased ferry tickets and waited. The trip was 15 minutes, and on the way we were treated to the nicest views of the Coast. Amalfi was absolutely packed with tourists. We wandered the streets, where I purchased some interesting looking pasta to send to my family. (Granny- they said they were going to hide it from you!) We found a nice spot for lunch before settling down on the beach to relax for the afternoon. We caught the ferry back, where it surprisingly started pouring down with rain on us. Pretty strange considering 10 minutes ago we had been lying on the beach in 30 degree heat! We walked back to the hotel absolutely drenched, had showers and decided to nap. This “nap” turned into a 4 hour sleep for Jasmin, where she woke up at 9:30pm. It was a late dinner for us!

We caught another bus the next day, this time to Amalfi where we had previously purchased ferry tickets to Positano. Our third and final stop in the Amalfi Coast. After making our ferry by literally seconds, we were on our way. Arriving in Positano was interesting. We had our massive suitcases, and wondered how on earth we could get them to our hotel when the whole place was on a cliff. Luckily , there was some guys that had quads with mini trailers on the  back, designed to take luggage to hotels, as there are no roads for cars at the entrance to Positano. We sent our luggage off, and decided to have lunch before looking for our hotel. We ate pizza, and soaked in the view. This was already the best place that we had visited on the Amalfi Coast. Our hotel had the BEST view, looking out onto the ocean on one side, and out to the buildings on the cliff on the other side. The only bad thing was the 700 steps it took to walk there, but after eating a whole pizza, it was probably a good thing. The next day we decided to hire kayaks and a paddle board which turned out to be probably the most fun activity we had done this whole holiday. The water was crystal clear, and the view was unreal. This is where I wished I had a GoPro to film it. We paddled around for an hour, with Jasmin falling off her paddle board atleast 5 times, and then headed back to swim. We literally spent our whole time in Positano on the beach, and drinking cocktails (which definitely did not compare to Mykonos cocktails but still good) After 2 nights here, it definitely turned from PositaNO to PositaYES 😉

Exploring Mykonos

Following our trip to Santorini, I didn’t think any other place could top it off. And I was right, it didn’t. But Mykonos was still pretty cool. That is, once we finally arrived there. Long story short, we travelled to Mykonos from Santorini via ferry. The trip was supposed to take almost 3 hours, and when we arrived 20 minutes early we didn’t think anything of it. We grabbed our suitcases and headed off the ship ready to explore a new island. Once we got to the end of the wharf, there were 20 or so people advertising their hotels. “Cheap room with a sunset view, girls?” We had already booked accommodation and the owner of our hotel was picking us up so we sat down to wait, thinking she just wasn’t there because we were early. One of the advertisers asked us where we were staying, and when we told them they hadn’t heard of it. We said it was right in Mykonos town and she laughed. “Mykonos? This isn’t Mykonos.” TURNS OUT WE WERE ON THE WRONG ISLAND. Little did we know, there was a stop at the island of Naxos before Mykonos. We found a ticket office, paid another 30 euros and grabbed some lunch during the 3 hour wait for our next ferry. And that is how we saw an extra Greek island.

Three hours later, we arrived in the actual Mykonos. Helen had kindly came back to pick us up, and we headed to our hotel. What a view! The building was blue and white, overlooking the ocean. Straight away we headed into the town to have a look around. There is no words to describe the streets of Mykonos. You don’t even feel like you are outside, the narrow alleyways are white and blue, with cute little stairways leading up to apartments above the local shops. We grabbed some food (gyros of course) and had a look around the shops. We had decided to head out on the town that night, so we found an alcohol store and went back to the hotel to get ready. I would love to say yeah, we had a great memorable night out clubbing in Mykonos however after not drinking any alcohol for almost 4 nights the night didn’t turn out too pretty and we were back in the hotel by 12:30pm. Tip: Only order Long Island Iced Teas in Mykonos if you are a pro alcohol as these things were LETHAL. We had to ask them to add some orange juice because neither of us could drink them! After sleeping off a killer headache, we knew we had to make the most of the day so we headed out to hire scooters. However, after being told that scooters are extremely dangerous especially as we hadn’t ridden them before, we went for a quad bike again. We decided to go to Paradise Beach, which was a 20 minute ride away and scope out the beach clubs for later that evening ( Yes we were willing to try again) The clubs were all lined up along the beach, and there were beach chairs lined up with people lying on them (Probably still out from the night before?) On the way back, we stopped at Paraga Beach which turns out was a nude beach. Back in Mykonos town, after getting ready for the evening, we went to our favourite place. Little Venice. The cocktails here are AMAZING! 14 Euros, but SO worth it. Plus you get a great view of the sunset. We caught a bus to Paradise Beach and the night began. More cocktails, dancing on tables, dancing with midgets and cheering when the dj called out ‘New Zealand.’

The rest of our time in Mykonos was pretty chilled, we ate more Gyros, wandered the streets and swam in the beach. As much as I liked Mykonos, I was ready to leave by 10pm the next night when we headed to the airport. Next stop: Roma! 

 

Dreams do come true

Santorini had always been high on my list of places to visit. There’s just something about the blue and white buildings, high on a clifftop overlooking miles and miles of sea that make you want to smile. Dreams were free. Well now they weren’t just a dream, but a reality. And they sure as hell weren’t free, but I can tell you this. After spending a week in Greece, it was worth every cent.

Getting off the plane in Santorini, it was extremely windy. Wasn’t expecting that, but who was I to complain. I was in GREECE. We got picked up by our hotel owner, and taken to what I could call paradise. Our room was all white, had a view of the sea, and to the left was the pool with chairs around it that I could just picture lying on later with a cocktail in my hand. Yes pleeeeease. We headed on a short walk into the capital, Fira, and had a look around. The main square consisted of food and souvenir shops, which we spent an hour looking around. We found some dinner, and possibly the best gelato spot then headed back to our hotel. The next day, we decided to put our lives at risk and hire quad bikes. This is a definite recommendation for anyone who goes to Greece, and how most of the locals rely on transport. Our hotel owner pointed out all the good spots and we were off. We headed to Oia, another major tourist spot in Santorini. It took us about 25 minutes to get there, but being on the open road overlooking the sea and barely any other cars or quads around, it was a thrill. We parked up and walked around the corner. What a sight. This is what I had been waiting for. It was like a postcard. We walked along the path, stopping for a smoothie along the way and making sure we took loads of pictures and updated our snapchat stories so everyone back in NZ could see what paradise looks like. We spent the day in Oia, looking through shops and just walking around the amazing streets. The sunset in Oia is supposedly world famous so we definitely did not want to miss that. After having dinner on a rooftop, we headed for the lookout where hundreds of other keen tourists were already gathered. After watching the sun go down, we headed back to Fira on our quad bike, but not before stopping for donuts on the way home!

The next day, we had decided to book a sailboat tour. To get to the port, you have to take a gondola to the bottom, which was fun. You could get a whole view of the cliffs of Fira. We found our boat and headed off. We were going to some hot springs, and a volcano. I absolutely love being on boats, in the middle of the ocean with a slight breeze. We got to the hot springs, and got to jump off the boat to swim over to them. They weren’t exactly hot, but it was nice being in the ocean in 30 degree heat. After that, we headed to the volcano. It took about 20 minutes to walk to the top, and once we were there I was definitely ready for a swim again. After arriving back to Fira, we decided instead of taking the gondola to the top, we would take a typical Greek way. Donkeys! It was 5 euros to get up there, but so worth it. I felt like Lena off Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants. We then went straight back to our hotel and jumped in the pool for a nice swim. For anyone who has been to Greece, or is planning a trip you must have Gyros! Your choice of meat, some red onion, chips and sauces all wrapped up into a pita for 2.30 euros. Perfect for a cheap and yummy dinner! However we decided for our last night in Santorini, we would choose somewhere classy. A restaurant on the clifftops with a glass of wine and a bowl of pasta. This was the life. Out of everywhere I have seen in the world (which isn’t many places) Santorini is my favourite. I would’ve happily spent longer than 3 days there, but knowing I was going to another Greek island (which ended up being 2 islands, but thats a story for another day) tomorrow was exciting. And plus, I know that eventually I’ll end up back here!