Europe 2011 day 10: Mykonos, Greece

Our next stop on day ten (Sept. 22) was to the lovely island of Mykonos!

Good morning Mykonos!

This was my second favorite stop of the trip, it was so lovely and it is known as the party island of Greece.  Actually, my dad did some partying of his own there in the 70s.  I'll have to get those stories someday...

The start of our day was a little interesting.  At all our other stops we had an easy way to get into town -  not so much at Mykonos.  We couldn't really find a way to get into town (no busses or cabs that we saw) so just when we thought we were in for a long hike a very nice local named Johnny came up to me (he spoke no English) but motioned to me that we could ride in the back of his truck into town.  I usually don't take rides from strangers, but Johnny seemed pretty legit and we really wanted to get into town.

So Nick and I hopped on the back of Johnny's tiny three wheeler truck and the three of us rode into town.  It was only slightly terrifying as the roads are really, really, really winding, bumpy and narrow and we were in a teeny, tiny pickup truck. But we made it into town safely and thanked Johnny for his genrous ride and offered him some euros as a thank you.

our awesome driver Johnny and our little ride

We walked up to a viewpoint to get some views of the town and took some pictures

There were a lot of cafes by the water so we sat down and took in the scenery with some caffe lattes and croissants

We then did some exploring of the town...

this little guy was just posing for me

I guess this is a famous church where a lot of photoshoots take place, there was one going on and you can see the photographer right by my leg

I read the beaches are lovely on Mykonos and the most famous of them is one called Paradise Beach.  It's apparently quite the party at night.  We rented some chairs for a couple of hours and did some swimming.  

When we got back into town we had some gyros (not as good as the ones in Athens but still delicious)

Mykonos is a very windy island and famous for it's windmills so we checked those out and took some pictures by them

Right below the windmills you get view of  this area they call "Little Venice"

windy!

At the windmills we ran into some people from our cruise ship we became friends with and they are nactually 100% Greek (lived in Chicago but had family in Greece).  They speak fluent Greek and told us they were going to a bakery that was recommended to them and asked if we wanted to join - yes was the obvious answer.  At the bakery we ordered a big assortment of Greek pasteries and ate them outside.

A final picture as we left Mykonos, we had a great time non the lovely island and would love to go back someday!

Next stop - the highlight of the trip - the lovely and picturesque island of Santorini!