Mykonos Greece

[thunefeld]

The NCL Spirit Southern Europe * Eastern Mediterranean Cruise

October 26-Nov 6, 2013

Venice > Greece > Turkey > Western Italy > Barcelona

 

I am convinced that the only reason that Mykonos appears in Rick Steves’ Mediterranean Cruise book is because it is, indeed, a “cruise island” – one that many ships stop at. If you are into beaches, they’ve got them here. There is nothing of historical significance on Mykonos, except to take an NCL shore excursion to the island of Delos. We assumed (bad assumption) from reading reviews that a frequent (3x a day) ferry would take us to Delos for a few dollars, but on the day we arrived at 2 p.m. (Halloween – late in the season) the only ferry had already departed. I guess that during the summer months the ferries run more frequently.

 

We walked around the pleasant-enough (tourist) town, but one tourist shop looks like another whether you’re in the USA or Europe. Mykonos reminded me of any US tourist town (tourists wandering aimlessly, sucking ice cream cones, lugging cameras, taking snapshots of everything) with a Mediterranean flair.

 

Rick says the best part of Mykonos is walking around and getting yourselves lost so that is exactly what we and hundreds of others did - because it is impossible to stay "unlost" - no matter how hard you try. It’s like the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul only with streets instead of aisles!

 

The town is exactly as Rick describes, and we had great fun waking through the narrow winding alleys and gawking at the tourist stuff in the shops. GPS doesn't work in the narrow alleys of the town, so the only way we oriented ourselves once in a while was by finding a hotel on the map that we happened across. We gave up trying to find anything described by Rick except the ‘marshmallow church’ and the windmills and otherwise delighted in walking in circles, listening to life go on behind closed shutters in residential neighborhoods, peering through gates and over walls into lush courtyards, exploring tiny orthodox chapels and their artifacts, and generally staying lost. You can’t get too lost, however, because uphill goes away from the sea, down hill brings you closer to the sea.

 

Some (30%?) of the shops and hotels were already closed for the season, with windows and signs in the process of being boarded up for the off season. A pleasant walk on a 70 degree F sunny Halloween day.

 

Terry Hunefeld & Ann Dunham

Inn At Moonlight Beach Bed & Breakfast

San Diego

 

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If you’re on an NCL shore excursion, the process for disembarking for one of their paid shore excursions is streamlined, straightforward and efficient like all of the processes on NCL. This is quite a feat considering that there are sometimes thousands of cruisers getting off the boat to board dozens of different buses.

 

However, if you wish to do your own thing, and be among the first off the ship, here is a tip: For example, we wanted to do Athens “on our own” and it was our first port of call – so we had no experience with the disembarking process. We wanted to be in the first group off the ship to “beat feet down the street” to get to the metro and to the Acropolis when it opened at 8 a.m. to beat the crowds because Rick Steve said that the best time to be at the Acropolis is before the tour busses disgorge throngs of tourists at 10 a.m. He was dead-on correct!

 

BEWARE: NCL Spirit arrived at the cruise terminal at 6:40 a.m. We were told by two different NCL employees the evening before that there would be an announcement as to when we could disembark, so to be “waiting in our room” or in a “public area” until the announcement. We were discouraged from queuing up near the stairs or elevators prior to the announcement. When we had not heard anything by 7:20, we wandered down to see what was happening only to find that disembarkation had begun 25 minutes before! I inquired why (again asked 2 separate NCL employees) who replied that the ship does not make announcements before 8 a.m. So, there you have it… if you want to be first off before 8 a.m. on an NCL cruise, you need to be aware. My motto after this misinformation was to ask multiple different NCL employees the same question until I got the same answer THREE times. That seemed to work okay.

[nparmelee]

Delos closes early afternoon, you usually can only get over there in the mornings, occasionally some ship excursions can get there in the afternoons. For others, usually Delos is closed on Mondays and the ferry times from Mykonos other days are 9, 10 and 11 am, return ferries are at 12:15, 13:30, and 15:00. It's too bad you couldn't get over to Delos, we found it quite fascinating. We also found Mykonos to be a fun little town, good for wandering and shopping and nice meal.

[paul929207]

Delos closes early afternoon, you usually can only get over there in the mornings, occasionally some ship excursions can get there in the afternoons. For others, usually Delos is closed on Mondays and the ferry times from Mykonos other days are 9, 10 and 11 am, return ferries are at 12:15, 13:30, and 15:00. It's too bad you couldn't get over to Delos, we found it quite fascinating. We also found Mykonos to be a fun little town, good for wandering and shopping and nice meal.

I found Delos to be fascinating and well worth the effort to get there.

[cruisemom42]

Delos has short hours all year round, and ferries are not frequent. Sorry you missed it -- it's a lovely site, especially when it's not too hot to enjoy strolling around.

[VirtualRain]

IMHO, Mykonos is a photographers dream... There's literally a great photo waiting around each corner. I thoroughly enjoyed it for that aspect, and how well kept and maintained it is including white washing the mortar between stones on the pathways. My GF also enjoyed the shopping and we had one of our best Greek lunches of the trip in Mykonos. :)

[KirkNC]

Thanks for you DIY posting.