 |
| One of my favorite photos, I have used this shot to illustrate Mykonos and the Mediterranean many times. This is the shoreline right in the small Mykonos Harbor Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
MYKONOS, GREECE was kind of our halfway point for the cruise. It had been amazing so far. And we still had Rome, and Naples and the Amalfi Coast ahead. We had booked a company for both of these last days called Rome-in-Limo, who we have used successfully since. We haven't used them recently, but if they are anything like they were in 2013 and 2017, I could not more highly recommend them.
 |
| Mykonos - hotels, bars and restaurants along the shoreline - though this looks rocky, we did find that there was a very nice, sand beach on our return trip to the island in 2017 Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
I DIDN'T really know much about Mykonos, other than that it was a small, traditional Greek, vacation island. Our stop there was a shorter than usual one as we didn't arrive until early afternoon. That suited us fine. We had been on the go since Athens. We did not have any excursion plans and we just planned to get of the ship, walk around and may get something to eat and/drink. Which is pretty much what we did.
 |
| Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
MYKONOS IS a "tender" port, meaning for anybody who doesn't know, that there are no docks for tying up a large cruise ship. Instead, the ship anchors off shore and the passengers are "tendered" in smaller boats to the shore. The little harbor of Mykonos is beautiful, and peaceful. It is pretty much a "quintessential Greek/Mediterranean scene," with small local fishing boats all over the harbor. It is also very colorful, with all the buildings whitewashed; with bright blue, red and yellow painted trim. There are also colorful flowers everywhere. Picturesque. My camera was happy!
 |
| Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
THE GREEK Isles are known for their iconic, whitewashed, Greek Orthodox churches - normally with bright azure blue (but sometimes red) painted domes or arches. There are 100's of them on Mykonos, including the tiny structure below which is right on the edge of the wharf in the harbor. You walk by it as you go to and from the tenders. I read somewhere that in the past, churches were allocated power and water first, and having a church nearby assured power to local residences (from Google "AI," so who knows how accurate this is).
 |
| Small, Greek Orthodox Church on the wharf - Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
THE PERHAPS best known and most often photographed church on Mykonos, though, is Panagia Paraportiani, which has a more standard, arched roof that is painted a colorful red, and decorated with flags and pennants. It is pretty much right in the center of the town.
 |
| Panagia Paraportiani Church - Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
ANOTHER ICONIC, "Mykonos" sight are the rustic windmills and towers up on a high point on the island near the town. I don't know why, but I struggled a bit to show them in their context here. I got a much better (I think) and more iconic shot of them when we returned in 2017. You can see they are consistent with their whitewashed, stucco walls. The blades, or turbines were curious to me though. They must work, but they don't seem to me to be as efficient as the traditional blades you see on - for example - Dutch windmills. While I spent a fair amount of time walking around the windmills, I really didn't come back with what I felt was a good "take" on them. I would have another opportunity a few years hence, with a better approach, and with a different photographic vision. Watch for a future blog on Mykonos.
 |
| Mykonos Windmills - Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
ONE OF the things we were learning to do was to seek out a cafe or establishment while on shore to fine WiFi, and download e-mails and catch up. At that time, I was still working full-time, and the nature of my practice meant I needed to check in at least every other day or so. We were using AT&T as our carrier at that time, and the cost to purchase an "across the pond" plan (even for 30 days) was pretty steep. So, before heading for the tender dock, we found a nice little coffee shop with a view down to the sea; got a cup of coffee and did our digital thing.
 |
| Sunset in Mykonos - Royal Princess Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
BACK ON board The Royal Princess, we sat out on our balcony with a coctail and watched on of those splendid Mediterranean Sunsets. You may have noticed that on this cruise, I had begun to make a habit of photographing the sunsets from our balcony, normally as we sailed away from our harbor (in later years, those photographs would more likely be from the back of the ship, where we often found a bar with a nice spot to sit. In this case, our sailing was delayed, however. The captain came on an made an announcement that there was a problem with the winch system on our anchored ship, and that our departure would be delayed while the crew made repairs. He assured us that there was plenty of time for us to make our next port. We had a scheduled day at sea, on the way up to Naples, our next to last scheduled port of call. For us, no worries. We cleaned up and went down to our assigned table in the main dining room. We expected, based on the captain's comments, that the repairs would put us an hour or two behind. I was able to catch another shot after dinner, as we had still not left the harbor. In fact, we didn't pull anchor and depart until around 11:00 that evening. Again though: no worries. Plenty of time to make up our late departure and make the Port of Naples by early morning of our scheduled stop. It was all good. That was what we thought, anyway.
 |
| Moon over Mykonos, Greece Copyright Andy Richards 2013 - All Rights Reserved |
Stay tuned . . . .
No comments:
Post a Comment
I WOULD LOVE TO READ YOUR COMMENTS: