The One About Greece

I think it’s high time I shared my photos from my trip to Greece. As you know, I went for the wedding of Doreen’s son Andrew, and I will share wedding photos in a separate post. This one is about my time in Nea Makri, Athens, and Rafina.

We stayed in Nea Makri in a hotel right on the water. The view from my hotel room was gorgeous and I slept every night with the door open, the sound of the waves was lovely.

Our hotel was NLH and the staff couldn’t have been more wonderful. There was a huge breakfast buffet every morning, and my favorites were the roasted tomatoes, the yogurt, the honey (it was literally a giant honeycomb dripping into a glass jar), and the omelets.

The palomas were also very very good.

On our first night in Greece, Jo-Ann and I went across the street to a restaurant that was dubbed as a pizza place. Spoiler alert: we didn’t get the pizza. They had a number of Greek specialties available daily and we shared the moussaka, pastitsio, and stuffed peppers. The pastitsio was so good it brought tears to my eyes. No, I’m not kidding.

We had one day in Athens and visited the Acropolis, of course. The beginning is quite steep, with a lot of stairs, and I almost bailed. And then I gave myself a lecture and realized it would be pretty silly to travel over 4000 miles and not make it to the top. I took my time and it actually got easier as I got higher up. I love this photo of Hannah and I and I couldn’t help but think how much my mom would have loved that the two of us were in this incredible place.

We had lunch at a rooftop restaurant with a view of the Acropolis behind us. The food was terrific and I had a Greek salad and stuffed vine leaves. Did you know that traditional Greek salad doesn’t include lettuce? It’s just tomatoes (probably the best tomatoes I’ve ever eaten) and cucumbers with olives and (sometimes) green pepper, and big triangles of feta.

That meal was literally the last one I paid for since everything from that point forward was part of the wedding festivities. There was the rehearsal dinner, where this picture of Doreen and I was taken. There was a welcome party where we were taught traditional Greek dancing. There was the wedding itself, which was incredible. And there was the party the day after at a private beach club.

I visited the bride’s family’s favorite swimming hole and got myself into the Aegean Sea. It was cool but not cold and the water is super salty so it’s very bouyant.

The days flew by and it seemed like it was time to leave before I even got used to being there. That’s the way with good trips, I suppose.