Skopelos to Skiathos non stopios

In retrospect, I should have realised yesterday what was to come. As we were sat outside enjoying the pool and the sunshine there was a strange occurrence, at 5.45pm the sun briefly slipped behind a cloud. I am pretty sure that this was practically the first cloud we had even seen in the 2 weeks we have been in Greece so the fact that it blocked the sun should have been a sign. Combined with the fact that our sea taxi had needed to move our booking back a few hours due to high winds indicated that a change was afoot. When we woke up this morning Jess and I enjoyed a morning swim, although for the first time it was maybe not because it was so hot we just had to, rather it was because we had a pool to utilise. We swam for a bit before waking up the girls and then we slowly started getting organised to move on, packing, cleaning etc. There were some clouds coming over the back of the hill behind us, then there was a very large rumble of thunder. Then it wasn’t long and it actually started raining. This was most unexpected, as far as I would have thought based on what we have experienced so far, rain was a very rare occurrence in the Greek islands. But rain it did, and it really started to chuck it down, At one point as the rain moved across, not only could we not see Skiathos in the distance, we could not even see the coast of Skopelos. It was very refreshing to feel cold, even if it was just for a little while.
We eventually left the one night house and headed down the port to drop off our car. It’s very strange but they don’t feel the need to meet you, all you have to do is park the car, leave the keys under the visor and off you go. A very trusting system. We then went looking for our seataxi, basically just a small boat to shuttle us between the islands. It was still a little windy but it had definitely calmed down from earlier. We got on the boat and set off, as soon as we were on the sea we crossed the wake of a large ferry coming in to port, and combined with the large waves, Allegra got very worried and almost immediately buried her head in Ruby’s lap. The skipper was a real pro and deftly navigated the waves and got us safely to Skiathos..
The first stop was picking up the car and everyone left this up to me and went off to have milkshakes and ice chocolates, I had to stand in a hot stuffy office while some 12 year old who had no idea what he was doing tried to sort out all the paperwork. It took a while but it got sorted and then it was off to find our accommodation. For some reason I had got a very uneasy feeling about this while waiting for the car, there had been no message from the host, they hadn’t responded to my messages and the location of the property on Google Maps showed up looking like a building site. So I just had a feeling that we had been scammed. We drove to the location and there was indeed nothing there, so we drove on a little further and parked up. Then Mumlock Holmes and John Dadson got on the case, investigating the photos we had of the property for any indicators and we managed to solve the case of the missing villa.
After getting set up in the property it was off to a supermarket to pick a few things up, followed by a bakery. I have a golden rule that you should never go into a bakery hungry but this was broken today. Not a smart move because everything they had looked tasty. We loaded up and managed to get out with plenty of treats , although less than I would have expected. We had a few different baklavas and some other things as well, I can confirm that they were all very tasty indeed. A few hours to relax a bit before heading out to dinner with a short walk to a local taverna, only to be told they were fully booked. There was nothing for it but to head back to the supermarket to pick up dinner supplies and then come back to the villa to get it all ready and also to have a nice long chat with Lily, only 6 more sleeps until she is here with us. So all in all it was a pretty nothing sort of day, albeit one where we never seemed to stop moving for any length of time. No wonder we all feel knackered.Leggi altro