Hydra (Greece)

The port of Hydra, capital of the island of Hydra

Some local chicks in national costume - Hydra port in the background

The port from another angle, with brother and sister in the foreground

 



Donkeys awaiting arrival of the next ferry ...

... to transport luggage to the local hotels ...

 

... or tired Australian children to the next village! (OK, yes, we know that one's actually a horse ...)



Unfortunately, we left Hydra a couple of hours before this intriguing-sounding meeting started ...

 

Jen:

I had never been to Greece (Matthew had a couple of weeks in Crete as a teenager). I love Greek food and the sound of Greek islands, so we picked two to visit in the middle of our Big Trip.

Hydra was exactly what I'd hoped for as a relaxing island getaway. It's a 90 minute ferry ride from Athens, but a world away as far as atmosphere goes.

Our house (https://www.airbnb.com.au/rooms/1091570) had a great stone terrace overlooking the sea and the Peloponnese Peninsula beyond. It was a 15 minute walk from the port of Hydra, where the ferries arrive. And you do lots of walking in Hydra, as there are no cars - just donkeys, water taxis and feet!

Leonard Cohen has a house there and wrote a song about one of the restaurants we had lunch at. We kept an eye out but didn't see or hear him while there!

The food was great - hearty and tasty. We didn't get sick of the super-fresh Greek salads, served with an entire block of feta perched on the top. The chips were pretty amazing - just like Dad and Grandma make at home, the girls said (although not quite as good, of course). And that was the thing - so many of the restaurants we went to were family businesses offering home-style cooking.

One day we left our house and said hello to a builder doing some work on the property next door. We strolled five minutes to a nearby restaurant for a late lunch, where the female proprietor took our order. Her young son came home from school in time to bring us our first dishes - obviously one of his regular after-school chores. As we were eating, the builder walked into the restaurant, greeted his family and came back out a few minutes later wearing fresh clothes and carrying our next course.

Our time in Hydra was made all the more special for spending it with Matthew's sister Becky, who flew over from London for the week.

 

Becky:

Jen said the trick to blogging is to write about something while it’s still fresh in the memory. My holiday with Edie, Della, Jen and Matt will remain fresh in my memory for as long as I have a memory (here’s hoping that’s a very long time. Though as Della pointed out when I told her my age: “you’re half-way there, Aunty Becky”).  Anyway, here goes.  

Another exotic rendez-vous, this time at the ferry port of Pireaus just outside Athens. The gang were fresh from the Italian leg of their holiday so after many “baci” and “come stai?”s, we set off together on our Greek Odyssey, destination: the beautiful island of Hydra.  Car-free and cat-full are two adjectival clauses that best describe Hydra for me. We arrived at night, giving us the illusory treat of arriving twice – once in darkness and again the following morning when we could look around our new home. And how beautiful it was. Once again Jen had played a blinder, finding us a gorgeous apartment with a view overlooking Kamini, the prettiest port on the island. End-to-end French windows along one wall, and a huge flagstone terrace meant we could just trip out of bed and spend the day ogling the view. The terrace also became our preferred destination for breakfasts al fresco, improv yoga sessions for me and the girls, and, crucially for Della, the appointed meeting place for our adopted wild cat (aka Smoodges, Smoodger and The Smoodge).

When we could tear ourselves away from the terrace, we made trips into the main town – usually along the coastal path which offered stunning views of the Aegean sea. Holiday life took hold quickly, with the biggest decision usually being where we should eat lunch. The food was, without exception, delicious. Matt and Jen took some photos and I hope some of them get posted with this blog. It was also fun to catch up with my friend Catherine from Barcelona who happened, by coincidence, to be on the island at the same time.

When we weren’t going for walks or sitting in restaurants, we did a lot of “Hydralaxing”, reading books, drawing and making saddles for Edie’s horses, patting cats, cats and more cats (mostly Della), playing Scrabble (where Edie and Della got a hit of both maths and spelling to compensate for their time away from school), and the occasional swim and lunchtime cocktail (M&J).

Whether we were mistaken for a Greek family, with our Greek tops and slippers, I don’t know. But what I am sure of is, this. My favourite part of the holiday, without a doubt, was hanging out with the gang, chatting about this and that, and just being “Aunty Becky”.