Last day on the Islands....

Yesterday was a lot of fun. The weather was beautiful and the wind was calm. We took the ATV on our biggest trip yet on this island that included some "extreme" off roading! We climbed to the very top of a hill for a great view and then ended up on the other side of the island - a short cut through the hills. The roads were crazy bumpy with only large loose rocks - much more "extreme" than a dirt road. We took lunch sea side and experimented with some seafood. The fish looked like nothing we've ever seen. The filet resembeled a peeled apple - it was very strange and not that great. After an afternoon on the beach we headed back to town.

We had a quick snack and beer during "happy hour" which was great and then played some paddle ball on the beach wall watchign the sun set. The sun sets are amazing here. The sky turns colours of pink/red that we have never seen.

Later that night we had a snack which was a waffle, covered in chocolate and topped with whipped cream, fruit, ice cream, and chocolate sauce. It was like nothing we've ever heard of - this thing could have easily fed 4 people - that said, jessie and I made short work of it using our vacation as an excuse for our indulgence.

The EuroCup is on and we were at a packed house because Greece was playing Russia on a VERY big screen. Greece lost, unfortunately (because we're long time Greek football fans), but it was neat to see how excited that the fans get. You'd think people were dying based on their reactions.

Today is a slow day involving a ferry ride to Athens. We'll have our last greek meal in Athens tonight and maybe do a bit of shopping to fill out the last available spots in our packs before boarding the big plane home tomorrow!

See you all soon! (Back to work on Wednesday...boo)

Paros, Greece

Hello.....

Another short post today, unless we get a few pics up.

We had an awesome night last night involving dinner only feet from the sea, cocktails during happy hour which were completely ridiculous, and a night-cap coffee/snack coupled with a walk through an interesting little shopping area. The cocktails were so delicious - They were huge and made with fresh juices. Jessie was "done" after 2.

Today we slept in, shockingly.....and after a nice lunch in a courtyard covered by flowers overhead, we rented an ATV on this island and hit the road. Our new ATV is much faster and more fun - plus we're that much more comfortable on it, so its great. Jessie spent a bit more time at the helm, so that's a good sign!

Its VERY windy today on the island but after some exploring and checking on the windy side of the island we did some offroading and after a number of backroads found our way to a very quiet beach with only a few other people. The beach had an awesome view of a seaside town and beautiful rolling hilss behind us. All of the beaches we've seen yet included very sharp declines from shallow to deep water whereas this beach allowed us to walk out at least 100m before the water passed our wastes. After a very enjoyable swim and some paddle ball, we took a more direct route back to our hotel where we plan on readign a bit by the pool before heading in to town for dinner and "potentially" a movie. We say "potentially" as our first two attempts to find the movie theatre were unsuccessful. Its "open air" so we think it'll have a drive-in feel and we're quite excited about it. Jess is keeping her fingers crossed for SATC (or for the men out there - Sex in the City). Steve is hoping otherwise.

Anyways - we really appreciate your interest in how things are going.

See you all soon!

Mykonos Greece

Hi everyone,

Short post today. We're not up to much!

Yesterday we rented an ATV after returning our tiny car. After checking out a beach last night we had a nice dinner and went out for drinks. We know that we keep writing about it but the prices blow our mind! 5EURO for Gin, Tonic NOT included. 2.50EUR for tonic. We're talking $12 drinks - ridiculous. Sunscreen is a wonderful 20EUR - luckily jess brought an ample supply.

This morning we slept in a bit and took the ATV on another trip after lunch. We visited two amazing beaches and went swimming at both. The water isn't warm, but the air is and once you're in, the water is fine. Its so clear and beautiful that we get over its temperature relatively quickly. The ATV is so much fun. Its quick enough to give you a bit of a rush but slow enough to remain safe. We remain the geeky tourists with helmets none the less. Jess even took her short turn as pilot yesterday! Very brave!

The second beach we visited was called "Super Paradise" (not to be mistaken with "paradise" beach which is nearby). We had to decide which to visit, but honestly, is it that difficult? Would you rather go to "Paradise Beach" or "SUPER Paradise Beach" - the decision was easy. Regardless, it was nestled between two huge hills which avoided the wind. There is a great club/bar at its back and neat seating including bean bag chairs and beds (12EUR of course - so we hit the sand. :) ) We can't help but mention the level of nudity!!! It seems like the naked people outnumbered the clothed. Dudes were letting it all hang out. We knew that we weren't in Wasaga anymore.

We're going to make an attempt to overlook the prices tonight and have some fun on our last night on this very cool island before heading to Paros tomorrow. Jess presently has her 3rd application of masscara on, along with her Black Dress, so apparently we're having a big night. :) She's generally frowned on make-up for the past 4 weeks.

That's all for now. Can't wait to see all of you next week!

Samos/Mykonos

Hello from Greece.

After a very hectic move from Turkey to Greece we found ourselves on our first Greek island - Samos. Well we'd love to tell you of all the adventerous exploring we conducted, we're sorry to saythat Steve was very sick to his stomach and we ended up missing a day and a half on Samos. What we did see was many cafes set footsteps from the mediterranean. They were all very fancy and served starbucks style coffees (althought nearly DOUBLE the price!) and wonderful deserts including homemade Gelato!!! While Steve could not partake, Jessie assured him that the product wasn't good anyways and that she only had 3 separate servings to make sure that she just didn't have bad batches. :)

Yesterday we boarded a HUGE ferry for a 5 hour ride from Island to Island. The ship was AMAZING. It had everything on it. Multiple Cafes, big screen TVS with the news on them. We enjoyed the entire time on the deck taking in the wonderful views of passing ships and islands. We were met by our hostel owner in the Mykonos port and taken to our Hostel. We're just outside of the main town on the Island. We have a rooftop patio and a short walk down 100 steps to a beautiful beach. Last night we had a nice dinner at a sea side cafe where we watched an amazing sunset. The sky was more pink then we've ever seen. After getting caught up in some american TV movies in our room on our luxurious 13" TV, we slept in this morning and rented a car. This car is SO small. Its like a golf cart. Its actually a lot of fun to drive though as its standard and the roads are so narrow and windy. We go 30km an hour and feel like we're racing as the lack of seaside cliff guard rails makes us feel "dangerous!" :) We made great use of our "wheels" be circling the entire island today. We visited a few beaches which didn't have any tourists and went swimming. The water isn't hot, that's for sure, but once you're in its fine. Its beautifully blue and clear and its fun to see interesting fish swimming between your legs and all about. This afternoon we had a nice lunch and have been exploring the town of Mykonos. Its such a classic greek town. Every street is an amazing photo op. We have no plans for the next 2 days here but we're not too worried as we're looking forward to sleeping in and lazing on the beach. We think that we'll rent an ATV tomorrow to mix things up - that should be fun!

So, so far, so good. Minus the stomach sickness greece has been fantastic!

Thanks for reading! Bye for now!

The Last of Turkey

Hi All,

We finished our time in Turkey with a great final two days. First we went to Pamukkale which was located about 3 hours from where we were staying in Selcuk. We took a minibus back and forth which worked out great. Pamukkale's claim to fame is a large range of hills that are covered with limestone. It is quite the sight, it looks far away like snow, but when you get closer it's rock which is relatively smooth with small grooves throughout. (Check out the pic!)

You start at the bottom of the hill and work your way up, they ask you to remove your shoes to protect the rock which makes walking interesting at times as the ground is very rocky and was sore on our pampered feet :) There are man made pools along the way which have clear water and you can swim, well more like sit, in these. From the top the view is pretty amazing, you can see over the city but it also gives you a view of the limestone and the natural pools that have been preserved. The water is clear and we had a beautiful sunny day so the water in the pools was light blue. Against the white limestone it was a pretty amazing site. We enjoyed the day swimming and exploring this unique place. It was very warm out, perfect weather...Steve got a bit too much sun. He should have borrowed Jess' SPF 70 sunblock!

The next morning we went to Ephesus which is very close to Selcuk. Ephesus is an ancient city and there are many ruins to explore. It's amazing to think this was once a city filled with people, everything was very old and some of the sites were very impressive.

Yesterday afternoon we left Selcuk to head to Kusdasi, a Turkish port, to sail to Samos, Greece. What we thought was going to be a straightforward trip turned into quite the adventure. Our hostel advised us on what time to leave to take the bus to the port, as it turned out we should have left much earlier! We got off the bus and begin what was to be a 'short' walk to the port. We still had to pick up our ferry tickets from the travel agency we'd booked with and were definitely short on time. We finally found the agency with very little time to spare and it turns out we were at the wrong office. The woman at the reception area was trying to help but there was definitely a language barrier. We ended up having to run to the other office, then run down to the port where we were ushered quickly by security who said the ship was waiting. Since we were leaving the country we had to clear customs, so they had us running to customs and then we had to put all our stuff through security (like at the airport). Then it was a final sprint to the ship. They hadn't been joking when they said they were holding the ship for us, it started to sail literally the second we stepped on board. Whew, close call!!! We were so happy to put down our packs, it was way too much running with those heavy things on.

We were on the ferry for about an hour and a half to Samos which is a beautiful island with big rolling hills and a great walkway along the water with cafes and restaurants. We head out tomorrow to Mykonos for about 4 days and are excited to explore a new island and rent atv's or something like that.

Thanks for reading, we hope all is well with everyone at home!

Göreme & Selçuk, Turkey

Thanks as always for checkıng ın on us! We apprecıate the ınterest!

Yesterday we fınıshed our tıme ın Central Turkey wıth a day long tour of the Cappadoccia regıon. The morning featured a tour of an underground city used by ancient civilizations to escape enemy armies - This place was huge! We visted 8 of the 14 floors and observed one ventilation shaft that made the depth of the city very apparent. Navigating the city was challenging at times as spiral stair cases shrunk over time to slow enemy attacks should they occur. At many points we were nearly on our knees to avoid bumping our heads. Its amazing to think that ~2000 people would live in this underground city for as much as a month at a time. Because its made of volcanic rock, it was able to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The city included everything - schools, wineries, churches, morges, and stables - WILD! We then did a 4km hike through a gorge. The view was cool and it was a very pretty setting as we walked beside the river the entire time. After a decent lunch we visited "pigeon valley" which was yet another cool view of the area. Check out the picture attached. The town is to the left, and the typical volcanic ash formations are to the right.

The town was a cool place to stay a few nights. You can check out our hotel which was carved out of the rock in the pics (behind Jess). Our room was really neat and had a cool atmosphere (Pic below). The view from our doorstep is behind steve.

After dinner and some Baklava and Rice Pudding in Goreme, we went to bed early as we were up at 6:00am for our busy day of travel. After an uneventful flight west to the Coast, we had our first difficulty obtaining transportation from the Airport in Izmir to Selcuk. After becoming very frustrated with taxi drivers who spoke poor english and kept quoting us 90 turkish lira for the trip, an "abandoned" train station, terrible directions, and still worse english, we made our way BACK into the airport, THROUGH security to finally receive the help of a very kind man with good english. After spending over an hour of frustration in the airport, we got the directions we needed and were on our way! We paid 10TRY each for a 5 minute bus out of the airport, afterwhich we were dropped off on the side of the street. There was no bus stop, and no way to cross the busy thoroughfare between us and the location we "thought" was where we needed to pick up our next bus based on the mumblings of our current driver.

After another 15 minutes of wandering with our heavy packs, we did finally discover a method to cross the road. At that time, we began walking aimlessly down the street amidst sporadic quarreling of course only to find, to our surprise, a van with a sign entitled "Selcuk" coming towards us. Steve flagged down this van only to find that it was 6TRY per person to Selcuk.??? Is this how transportation to locations over 1hr away is organized in Turkey!?!?!? We were the first on the bus, as we believe that we did not enter from a standard, unlabeled location. We then became educated as to the local's method of procuring transportation. Why book a ticket online when the driver's assistant opens the doors of the moving van and shouts out the door - Selcuk! Selcuk! Selcuk! To our amazement, NUMEROUS individuals responded to this call, and in no time flat the van was full. On our way to Selcuck we dropped people off on strange roads and picked up other people who looked lost, homeless hitchhikers. Also, we can't help to mention the service we received while in transit. For our 7TRY (5CAD) we received hand sanatizer which was given to everyone from a water bottle. After approximately 20 minutes of our very long 1hr journey, water was distributed by the driver's assistant in a similar fashion to that of an airline stewardess. Jessie asked for a Wine Spritzer, however we were informed that they were currently out of stock. At the end of the day, we had a very interesting, incredibly frustrating however thankfully safe trip to our destination.

Our hostel tonight is clean and basic, but we are happy with it. The owner's nephew, like all of the hostel workers we've met, are amazingly helpful, friendly, and generous. We feel very at home.

Tomorrow we have a day long tour involving two 3 hour bus rides to Pammukale . We're exicted to swim in the limestone pools! We'll put some pics on facebook tomorrow night if we have a chance!

Love to everyone, hope you're well, bye for now!

Goreme

Yo Yo Yo,

Yesterday we flew from Istanbul to Kayseri (1hr) and obtained a ride to Goreme. After being ushered out of our transport with very little English instruction, we were met by a gentleman from the travel agency that owns the hotel we were staying at. All in all, the trip to the hostel worked out great, despite our skepticism! We were very pleased with our hostel as it looked exactly as it had in the pictures. We stayed in a CAVE! The hostel had a small patio with a great view of the surrounding area. Despite a cramped space, the hostel served us well, was a lot of fun, and was definitely an interesting experience.

After sleeping in this morning, we switched hostels to mix things up as we had always planned to and moved to a hotel owned by the same owner of the hostel we were at. We liked our first place, but we LOVE this place. Our room is much larger, is definitely still in a Cave, includes a fireplace, sitting area, and very modern bathroom including a turkish bath! We're on a secluded side of the "hill" and feel like we have the whole place to ourselves. There is an amazing view just outside our door and from the patio in the hotel. We'll post some pics on facebook.

After getting settled, we took in the "Open Air Museum" which is an excellent example of the unique terrain and cave homes/churches which were built within them. While treacherous at times, we enjoyed climbing into numerous caves - some of which hosted vibrant fresco paintings which were painted over 1000 years ago. The colour still looks great.

This evening, we were guided through Rose Valley. Rose Valley is a perfect example of why this area is so special. You can check out a short video from one of the many vantage points we enjoyed if you like - we've attached it in this blog.

The hike was about three hours and we took endless pictures. The rock formations are like nothing that we've ever seen before, and the variety of colours and variations in elevation are fantastic. The hike concluded with a very high view of the valley below, the beautiful rose valley hosting its pink rock formations and of course, the SUNSET! Jessica thinks this is VERY romantic. Steve was too busy taking pictures to realize this fact.

After an exhausting 8 hours of walking between the museum and hike, we sought refugee in our hotel where we enjoyed a wonderful dinner including our ever present ice cream desert, and equally ever present vista view!

We're off to bed for now, as we'll need our rest for a full 8 hour day of touring the area tomorrow. After that, we're off to the turkish coast!

Bye for now! J and S.