Day 11, May 13, 2024 – Mykonos, Greece. In the morning our ship arrived in Mykonos. We disembarked and took in a walking tour of Ermoupolis.
There are several old windmills across the bay from the ship dock. These islands in Aegean Sea all used wind power to grind wheat into flour.
This city (Ermoupolis) goes right up to the water. In the old section of town the stairways are all on the outside of the homes to conserve space. Many are brightly colored and some are very distinctive.
There are little churches (Catholic and Greek Orthodox) scattered all over the city. We are told that many families built their own church hundreds of years ago and are now not regularly used.
One part of Ermoupolis is known as little Venice since many of the houses and businesses hang over the water.
After we left Mykonos, by ship, just a few hours away we made port on Paros. We did a tour of the island.
There are several old marble quarries on Paros. These were no longer active but provided the marble for the Parthenon in Athens.
About 11 km from Parikia, the current capitol of Paros, is the village of Lefkes. It was the island’s first capital, believed to be founded in the 15th century, and according to the most dominant theory, its first residents were from Crete.
Check out the Church of Agia Triada in Lefkes.
We stopped in Lefkes for an afternoon snack of Galaktoboureko. Try to say that fast! It is a Greek dessert made with baked semolina custard and buttered filo pastry and finished with a spiced sugar syrup. Definitely a first cousin to Baklava without the nuts.
There were flowers everywhere!
We saw much more agriculture on Paros than the other Greek Islands including grapes, pomagrante, and olive vineyards, tomatoes and wheat.
We stopped at the Ekatontapiliani means the Church with the Hundred Doors, it only has 99 at the moment. Legend has it that the church contains 99 known doors, plus a secret door that is hidden. It is believed that the hundredth door will open once the church of Hagai Sofia in Istanbul becomes an Orthodox Church again. You can see the similarity to Hagia Sofia in how the dome was structured
Back in Parikia we checked out Panagia Ekatontapiliani.
This church dates back to 326 and was designed by one of the architects who build the Hagia Sofia in Istanbul.
This was our last night aboard M/V Arethusa and there was a captain’s dinner. At the end 19 crew members came to say goodbye and thanks.