Our writer Karen Kwan sets sail in the Greek Islands.
Image: G Adventures
“Opa! Welcome to sailing!” Our skipper, Jose, announced this happily. We were leaving Mykonos for Syros and although he was downright gleeful, I was, on the other hand, cold and wet from the wind and ocean, tightly clutching onto the sailboat and watching with fear as the boat angled precariously towards the water.
“This is sailing?! How am I going to make it through a week of this?” I asked myself. This was nothing like the calm catamaran sails I’d been on before. “So how far can the boat lean over before it tips?” asked Kent, one of the other five guests on this G Adventures trip. I was grateful to hear I wasn’t the only one who was unnerved. (The answer: the sailboat is most balanced upright, so it’s quite difficult for it to tip over. Phew!).
Thankfully, the rest of the trip was smooth sailing.
Image: G Adventures
We’d spent our first night of the trip in Mykonos wandering the stone pathways and eating seafood pasta at Fato a Mano (where the food was so good a local kid was sprinting in between bites to make room in his belly). Jet-lagged, we bypassed the busy bars in favour of an early night’s sleep on the boat.
With our kitchen filled with supplies from the market, we spent the next week sailing to a different island every day, as chosen by Jose and determined by the winds. Most days we set sail by a 9 a.m. for a few hours, then the boys would anchor the boat for a couple of hours (if you have an interest in sailing, you can gain some nautical knowledge—I learned a few knots).
Image: G Adventures
Anchored, we would have a quick lunch (including two epic halloumi feasts) and then we would go for a swim. Then, we would dock at the island’s marina, hop onto shore to satisfy our gelato cravings, then it was showers for everyone before dinner on land.
In Syros, at Oneiro, we devoured the best Greek salad of the entire trip (foodie tip: add sea fennel, if you can find it, to your Greek salads). In Kythnos, we walked to the cliff to take in the sunset (I got up early to use this same incline for hill training). In Kea, we hiked to the Lion of Kea, which, according to mythology, was sent by the Gods—jealous of the island’s beauty—to wreak havoc on the island. The figs we plucked from the trees during the hike whet our appetite for seafood dinner at Rolando’s Ouzerri. In Kythnos, we ate on the beach at Sailor’s Restaurant as cats roamed at our feet looking for leftovers.
Image: G Adventures
During a stop in Poros, we joined the other tourists stumbling through the steep winding maze of stairs up to the clock tower; the vista view is worth the sweaty climb. In Aegina, our last island stop, we got a hit of history and visited some ruins, including the Temple of Aphaia, the Paliachora of Aegina, and the medieval Tower of Markellos, but tired in the blistering heat, we kept our visits brief.
Image: G Adventures
Our final stop brought us to Athens for our flights home, where the traffic and crowds were jarring after a week at sea and immersed in the slower pace of island life. But it was time to find our land legs again and say a bittersweet “antio” to the skipper and new friends. —Karen Kwan
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