Paros Island

Monastiri beach
see all photos »

We arrived on Paros Island at around 11 PM.  As domatia prices have been rather high throughout the Cycladic islands, we're still camping (we can't believe it).  The guidebook mentioned Krios camping and we'd talked to someone who'd heard something good about it so we decided to go there.  There was a minibus meeting people getting off the ferry.  The drive to the campsite was only about 10 minutes or 5 km from Parikia's port.  However, on first glance, we weren't overly pleased with the campsite after the one on Milos.  The covered sleeping bag area was dusty and there were a lot of ants (and who knows what else)running around.  In fact, when we got up the next morning we found ants in our toiletry bag, congregating around any trace of toothpaste.  As well, there were some wasps buzzing around as we woke up.  However, there were some perks, such as free internet, free minibus shuttle to the port, and toilet paper in the bathrooms (don't laugh, this has become rare -- Aidan's resorted to appropriating it).  That morning we took a bus to Naoussa, which was about 20 minutes east.  Then we took a bus across the bay to Monastiri beach which was really great.  The water was blue-green, the beach was sandy and there were rock cliffs on the sides.  We perched our stuff on rocks on the side and went snorkelling.

Later that afternoon, we went back to Parikia and explored, then back to the campsite where we tried out the restaurant there.  Aidan had spagetti with lobster while Ainsley tried the vegetarian dish briam which turned out to be oven roasted vegetables.  Both very good.

The next morning, after realizing that we're running out of island time if we want to make it to Northern Greece, we took a ferry to Tinos, then Andros.