I’ve been getting quite a few messages asking about our recent trip to Greece, so I decided to put together a two-part blog with some background this week, and next week I’ll share recommendations if you’re planning your own adventure.
A week before our March departure, we received an email from our travel agent, Gate 1 Travel, telling us our cruise ship was stuck in the Strait of Hormuz. Translation: your trip might not happen.
Three days later, they gave us two options: cancel and get a full refund, or accept a revised itinerary: four days in Crete.
We went.
I refuse to let bullying politicians dictate whether I get to walk in the footsteps of my ancestors.
The trip itself? Smooth, except for the weather, which seemed determined to test our resolve. Intermittent downpours followed us as we climbed mountains in the cold. Where was Zeus when we needed him?
We made our way through Athens, climbed the Parthenon, continued on to Olympia, then Delphi where I picked up a cough that I chose to ignore, and on to Meteora. From there, back to Athens and a short flight to Crete.
And that’s where things got… strange.
I swear our hotel room in Crete was haunted. The first night, I had vivid, unsettling dreams. When I woke, my side of the mattress was halfway off the bed. I had to wake my husband to help fix it.
The next night? His turn. Same thing, odd dreams, followed by a thud as he hit the floor. His mattress was halfway off as well.
We’ve been married over fifty years. This has never happened. Not once.
Then came day three: a Sahara dust storm. Apparently they happen about three times a year, but this one, on April 1st, of all days, was next level. Nature’s idea of an April Fools joke.
Housekeeping had left our balcony door open.
We came back to a room coated in fine orange dust. My cough worsened, my eyes started itching and watering, and breathing became… challenging. My husband? Completely fine.
So now we know; I’m apparently allergic to the Sahara. Who knew?
Here’s the part that still gives me pause. Had we stayed on the cruise, we were scheduled to be in Santorini that same day. Cruise ships can’t dock there, so passengers rely on ferries and with that weather, those ferries wouldn’t have run.
We would have been stranded. No hotel. No luggage. No backup plan.
So… should I thank those bullying politicians?
Nope. Still not doing it.
One of the highlights of the trip was meeting a probable cousin at a small taverna in Crete. She’s a student at the University of Crete, originally from Kos and she looked exactly like me fifty years ago. Same dark hair, same eyes, same build. It startled my husband more than a little. She is even majoring in an area I did.
Maternal genetics don’t mess around even though I’m unable to prove we’re cousins.
The next day we flew to Kos Island, where I had booked a half-day tour through Travelocity. The company happily charged my credit card back in December and then never showed up.
Fortunately, the staff at the Kos Aktis Art Hotel stepped in and found a replacement: a wonderful guide from UniKos Tours.
He took me to what had once been vineyards, very likely the same land my family worked generations ago. Today, it’s a gypsy camp. The residents didn’t mind me taking photos, which felt like a small but meaningful connection to the past.
From there, we visited the Asklepieion of Kos, walked the mountainside associated with Hippocrates, stood beneath the tree where he is said to have taught, explored two medieval castles, stopped at Aphrodite’s temple where the sky promptly opened up and drenched us and found a perfect place to watch the sunset from a mountaintop.
It was, in a word, extraordinary.
Our return home, however, was anything but.
By then, my cough had worsened and my eyes were constantly watering. We spent a sleepless night in the Athens airport before flying to Munich (2.5 hours), waiting two more hours, then enduring a 9.5-hour flight to Chicago. After that? Two hours navigating customs and security, then sprinting to catch our final 30-minute flight to Fort Wayne. We made it with 23 minutes to spare.
Then came the 40-minute drive home.
Happy Easter.
Easter Monday was spent going from doctor to doctor in Auburn. No one had seen a “Sahara dust storm victim” before, which didn’t inspire confidence. My physician child kept telling me to just ask for allergy meds, but no one would listen. I kept getting sent somewhere else.
I finally landed in an eye doctor’s office, someone who actually knew what they were looking at, and I’m now on the mend.
Several locals have told me they’d never travel the way I do, for fear of getting sick.
I’d do it again tomorrow.
Life is what you make of it. Fear doesn’t take you anywhere worth going.
Next week, I’ll answer some of the questions I’ve been getting about traveling to places a little off the grid.