Today was a “Oh shit, its 9:20 and breakfast stops getting served at 9:30” day. For each of the days that we stayed at Nikolis Hotel we broke our fast on the roof top overlooking the old city. Each breakfast was similar but not the same, there was vegetables (usually tomato and cucumber), fruit (grapes, kiwi, cantaloupe , cheese and meats (yummo), Greek yogurt (with jam, marmalade and muesli), orange juice, some kick ass coffee (possibly the best coffee I have tasted so far), bread and a hard boiled egg. Breakfasts like this are bloody awesome and really get you off to a good start.

They were served by a young lass that also tended the bar in the evenings (although sadly we were never around earlier enough to sit and enjoy a carafe of wine in the court yard).

So I woke up wondering what time it was as somehow the sun was up quite high and the alarm had not gone off. 9:20, there goes the early start for the day.

After a quick breakfast, we proceeded to jump into the car for our west coast adventure  At this point Jill realized that she left the guide book in the room, so back I went to get it. What was that noise? that noise was me locking the keys in the car. After a quick jog back to the hotel and a call to tsambikus we were on the road (with the guide book in hands).

West coast!
Ruins of acropolis
Ruins of monistry and giant cross
Ruin of castle
Valley of the butterflys
Acropolis round two!

First stop, valley of the butterflys.

Walking, walking walking and more walking. We made our way through the beautifully man made valley of the butterflies however they basically hung a sign up “Out to lunch, be back in a few months” as we were a month too late for the actual butterflies. Never the less it was a nice walk up the trail and back which took around 2 hours in total into a valley and back out again. The end of the trail was a red slushy drink that was OUT OF THIS WORLD. It was simply called “strawberry”.

Then we wound our way through the mountains at which point Jill declared that we were “lost”, so we back tracked about 30 minutes before we got on the road again. It was decided that we would hit up the acropolis again today before it closed at 4:30 as we both really wanted to see it.

Next on the list of things to do was the ruins of another acropolis, which were pretty cool and the entrance was free (for some reason or another). There was alot of the foundation still in tacked and you could see a rough outline of where things had once stood.

After we toured again we went to get back into the car where I spotted a trail of animals following a car off into the distance, it was a very odd sight to say the least.

We were ment to stop in at a cafe in the middle of the island known for their fresh meat and good food however since we lost so much time on the alarm debarkle we decided to hold our hunger and press onto the acropolis.

After a considerable journey through some awesome country side we finally made it to Lindos around 3pm for the second time. The bus was no where to be seen so after wedging our little blue beast into a small parking spot we descended by foot to Lindos town.

At this point Jill and I were getting pretty frickin hungry again so we made our way professionally through the town (we were pros by then) to some of the restaurants around the base. The lonely planet guide said that Captains Bar was awesome but sadly they did not serve food so we settled for ceasars instead.

I was referred to as “Hello Australian” and we ordered a number of starters. Baked Feta with peppers kick some serious ass followed by the tziki. Sadly the roasted pork was a little lacking due to the bland flavor and the presence of around 40% fat.

After we wiped the cheese and yogurt (and narrowly avoided falling down the stairs) it was 3:30pm, plenty of time to explore the acropolis.

Upon climbing to the top of the approach we saw that today, the gates were open and that the acropolis was open until, 1830. I informed Jill that 1830 is actually 6:30 pm and not 4:30pm. We were both just happy that we were able to explore the acropolis. The entrance for this was also free.

The acropolis was massive and awe inspiring with plenty of historical plaques to tell you about what you were looking at. In addition there were some awesome views of Lindos, the surrounding resorts and the sea. There was some sheer drop offs down to the rocks where waves were crashing and some “Stupid b’s”.

Well worth the 2nd go around.

As the sun was drawing closer to the horizon we had to rush back to the ruins of a monastery which was reconstructed by some Italians to see a beautiful landscape as the sun was setting.

After this we went back to Old Town to find some grub to eat for dinner.

Dinner tonight was at a place called Romios which was recommended in the guidebook. We only got lost twice to getting to it but when we found it we were both glad that we did spend the extra time as it was quite atmospheric. Sadly it was so atmospheric that our waiter decided that he would spend more time drinking with another table than attend to us which was fine by us as we have a full carafe of wine and sore feet. Jill had an underwhelming dinner of swordfish and I had a stonkingly good veal clay pot contraption that was so tender that it makes my mouth water writing about it.

We did follow this up with some dessert, I grabbed some panacotta (which was disappointing due to its lack of flavor  and Jill went with the baklova which was pretty damn tasty (and so was the strawberry ice cream accompaniment . We finished off the meal with some on the house ouzo and headed back for the night.