Island mentality, Not.

I just printed this picture for Karin. It has been one of her favourites since we visited Knossos on Crete several years ago.

Speaking of photos, I placed four of my favourite photos on 1000 Places to See Before You Die but now I can't find the link. Time will tell whether Paros will be featured.

Update: It is actually SeeBeforeYouDie.Net


Our photos of Amorgos, however, are featured on this attractive site: Another Place to Go They have great travel pictures.

We also created another new page for our full service Paros web site called Greece Fun Facts. Some of the useful travel information is new; some has been published here before.

Hey, Hey, Hey, I went swimming today. Plus it's 11 P.M. and our front door is still wide open for air. What more can I say?

One of Karin's favourite garments is a sweatshirt given to her by her son, Stuart, as a souvenir of his time in France. It is from The Sorbonne in Paris and now is well over 25 years old.


La Sorbonne, itself, is over 700 years old and has decided to start it's expansion through Europe by establishing a campus in Athens.


Due to the already strong ties between Greek and French universities they hope to offer master's-level courses in law, communications, international relations and psychology in the academic year 2008-09.


This recent announcement is probably related to the Communist Student group that has been protesting in Athens. They are unhappy that the European Union is forcing Greece to recognize degrees from private schools related to foreign universities. Now third level education in Greece is going to have to compete with the rest of Europe. That will undoubtedly bring about great improvement.

Other opinions welcome. Please comment.

Last year a neighbor gave us a few gourds. Karin cleaned out a couple to make pots and tossed the seeds and other innards over our wall.

This year despite a dry, hot summer we had a bumper crop of volunteer gourds. This is just a portion of the harvest.

We picked them early because of the forecast was for extended rain and we did not want them to rot.

Does anyone know what we can do with them besides paint them and shake them? Help please!

This photo is from our veranda after the first night of cloud burst.



Attention bloggers and webmasters: AuctionAds, the eBay affilliate now has a new product, Shopping Ads that pay per click. Please see the sample at the bottom of this page.

I decided to create a web page specifically about Amorgos and our journey there, including the ferry stop at Donousa. It includes a lot of photos and a travel guide. We had a great time; hopefully you will enjoy it vicariously if you cannot include it in your island hopping itinerary.

Take a look at Amorgos & Donousa

Last week I read about a "premier" of the new film, El Greco, in Iraklion, Crete. Now the Director calls that a "sneak preview".
The official premier is being held in Athens with numerous officials and the visiting Queen of Spain, Sophia.

The painter, formally named Domenicos Theotocopoulos, was from Crete and lived a dramatic life in Spain. Without spoiling the plot it is a story of an artist against the establishment, the latter in the form of the Spanish Inquisition.

Accompanying the Athens premier is a major exhibition of El Greco's works and those of his students at the Museum of Cycladic Art. The paintings come from the Prado and other famous museums.

Read about film making on Paros and about painting on Paros on our full service web site.

Here is a trailer for the film:

Just as we are starting to make plans for our Paros Art Workshops for 2008 we see a report in The Granville Sentinel--I use Google Alerts as a news clipping service--about two former participants and a friend who are having a gallery showing in Newark, Ohio. Entitled "Greek Memories in Line and Colour", the showing includes works done on Paros as well as other Greece locations.

Congratulations to Margery Mitchell, Mary Helen Fernandez-Stewart and Don Gunnerson for presenting their art to a wide audience. Read more about the Showing HERE. Read more about Art Workshops on Paros on our site.


Also in 2008 the brand new Acropolis Museum will be opening in stages. Described as ultra-modern, it is the much bally-hooed environment designed to hold the Parthenon Marbles, better known as the Elgin Marbles, when and if the British Museum decides to return them to Greece.

In the meantime, starting on October 14th they will start moving the other priceless antiquities from the old museum atop the Acropolis down to the new location a good distance away. This will be done in a relay using three giant cranes. A successful dry run with a 2.5 ton piece of plain marble was carried out today.
15 October Update: This photo was lifted from BBC News.


This photo was taken by Karin yesterday on the dramatic island of Amorgos. The clouds were actually flowing over the cliffs like a waterfall. We spent three days there by way of the island of Donoussa.As soon as we get a description written up for our main web site we will include more photos and information here.

A university student blogger temporary living on Paros asked this question. She wrote:

"As September blows into October, the islands are already changing. When we arrived in Greece three weeks ago, the streets were thick with hundreds of tourists. Then they were gone. As suddenly as the season changed from beach weather to sweatshirt temperature, the crowds outside my apartment dissipated. Thank goodness.

I was riding in a taxi last Sunday with three good friends. Our driver was an old Greek man who could speak English fluently. I asked him curiously, what was his favorite time of year on Paros? He didn't hesitate, "When the tourists leave."

Imagine if our campus was an archeological site. Instead of 150 years old, it was 1,500 years old and known throughout the world for its beauty. Every year, millions of tourists would arrive by bus, train, and hot air balloon to snap pictures of buildings where we live. They would need food, water and places to stay. They don't usually recycle, rarely speak our language and typically leave their trash behind.
Prices everywhere would rise because of higher demand, but they would arrive regardless, awed by the beauty of our quaint paradise. And you, dear friend, would either cater to their needs or eventually be forced to leave.

At minimum you would need to speak something besides English. At that point we might understand how the citizens of Greece feel during tourist season."

Complete Original.

So readers, how would your life change if your town were "discovered"? Would the value of your property increase greatly? Would your children have better jobs or opportunities? Would you live more comfortably? Please comment.

My wife Karin's adventure continued from yesterday:

Last week Karin had an interesting day with a visitor from Canada. It started with the Agia Anargiri Monastery above Parikia. She writes:

"I have been here before but saw it differently this time because the person I went with had spent time here as a young man in 1965! He and several of his buddies were on a trip to Africa and then came to Paros to relax....the stories he told about what Paros was like and how the Greeks gave them food all the time, and were so kind to them in many ways, kept me interested for hours! The boys rented rooms here and then walked each day down a donkey trail to Parosporos Beach to swim! He said they were really fit...and that Parikia was a small village at that time....and the landscape was NOTHING like now....no houses and road. He said the road out of Parikia to Parosporos was nothing more than a dirt track!!!

Also he was told that this Monastery was originally a house of a rich Parian who did "something bad" to a brother, and then turned his house into a religious place as a penance.




How it looks from the road up.






How it looks from the courtyard down.

For those of you who know Parikia, you can probably spot landmarks such as the church, the marina and the port.

"My friend and his buddies rented a room for 3 drachma a day, which he thinks was about 5 cents or less! That included spring water directly from the mountain (still there but now tapped with faucets), a view, and an outside oven for cooking! Oh, and outside privy!! He slept on a straw mattress on a wooden platform which was what beds were then in remote farms and the like. No electricity. He said that there was electricity in Parikia, but not much, so when you looked down at night you saw very few lights and also they were not bright like now. Usually it was moonlight as they came up the hill "slightly inebriated!" from parties that the Greeks invited them to...dancing, great food, the real Greek experience. "

Please come back tomorrow for Part Two.

Read more about Paros on our full service web site.