Leaving Corinth, we drove all morning crossing a surprisingly modern bridge between Patra and the mainland- the high toll told us why, better to drive a bit extra and pay the toll than to sit in ferry waiting for it to “fill up” to cross the channel to Delphi...
The drive was long but low-stress as we made our way around the bay and along the coast to Itea then up the very steep cliffs to Delphi. This town is perched on a mountainside with breathtaking views of the valley. Our hotel is very nice affording us a much needed late-afternoon nap. This evening we strolled through the streets of this idyllic little town and found some great items in the shops and a light dinner with live and (mostly) traditional music.
Tomorrow the ruins and archeology of Delphi then on to Athens... ~S
Today has been a great day. We slept great last night in our single twin beds :) and woke at 9:00am this morning. We enjoyed a most delicious taste of Baklava that Stanley purchased the night before and checked out of our hotel. Most Greek establishments (restaurants, hotels, cafes, etc) do NOT take credit cards... so our cash was depleted after paying our hotel bill. We are in search of a bank and easily find one down the street, a great start to the day! On our way to Delphi we go. There is a ferry from a town just up the way, but according to our hotel clerk, the ferry only leaves when it is full, so there is a chance we would have to sit there waiting for a long time. The other route to Delphi is by road, but you have to drive all the way back to Patra, across the bridge, and then double back on the other side (Delphi is just northwest of Corinth on the other side of the bay. Option 3 would be to drive to Athens and then back to Delphi. We liked option 2 best, so we drove along the coastline to the bridge.
This bridge was very cool - something Stanley read said it was the longest or largest cable bridge in the world... we took some neat pictures. The Peloponnese is very beautiful, and so is the mainland side, but I would say it looks more like Utah in it’s terrain... dry and brushy. Very mountainous here, no matter where you are. We drove along the coastline toward Delphi and stopped for a delicious lunch at a little beach cabana that was literally on the beach in a small little coastal town along the way - we dont even know the name of the town we stopped in. It was delightful, but way too much food and afterward we were both really tired, so we finished our drive to Delphi and located a hotel.
This hotel is one we booked for our trip, but then cancelled because we didnt know when we’d be getting up this way. It’s funny because today, Wednesday, is the day we were originally scheduled to be here. The most interesting part, and one for note for those of you who plan to travel and book with Expedia... Expedia’s price for this hotel, booking online was $102 a night. When we arrived and asked if they had any rooms to rent, the price is $65. A much better way to go! I would recommend to anyone who is not staying in big cities like Athens or Rome, to just rent rooms on the go instead of booking through Expedia or online because the prices are so much better.
We checked in and then snuggled down for a nap - it felt great! After our 2 hour nap, we woke at 6:30pm, so we made our way into the town of Delphi, which is just one street above our hotel, and checked out the very cool little shops here. We managed to get some amazing swag here in this town - really nice stuff for amazing prices. Every shop owner gave us at least a 30% discount which we thought was pretty cool.
After shopping we stopped at a little restaurant that had live music, ordered some dolmathes and fresh fruit... a delightful dinner after our enormous lunch. The service here was really terrible, they ignored us almost 100% after they delivered us our food. It took us nearly 45 minutes to get our bill and pay. That is very uncommon for our dining experiences here so far. The food was great though.
Back to our hotel, and Stanley is outside reading while I’m waiting for pictures to upload and working on our posts. Internet here, as we’ve said, is hard to find, and when you do, a lot of the time it isn’t wireless, so we’re unable to post our pictures from Stanley’s computer. That is the reason for the delay in getting new posts out. But our hotel has wireless, so after we get things ready, we’ll walk downstairs to the lobby to post everything.
A sidenote: I noticed yesterday that this site only allows us to post 99 pictures per page, so many of our pictures havent been posted when we thought they were. We’ve rearranged some of the pages so that all the pictures will fit. So be sure to go back through all of the photo links so that you dont miss anything. Sorry about that!!!
We miss you all - but we’re having a great time. Into Athens tomorrow, and then onto Patra on Saturday so we can head back to Venice... I cant wait!!! ~M
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