Mykonos - the party island

walking on water
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"Mykonos...welcome to pary island."  If that sounds cheesy imagine some DJ saying it over and over.  Mykonos is one of the big party islands for Europe.  Not as crazy as Ibiza, a little more like spring break in the US.   It's pretty funny that when we asked people on island suggestions everyone suggested Mykonos...and EVERYONE said that it did have a gay scene but there was nothing wrong with that that it shouldn't stop us from visiting.

Boat is the transportation of choice of intra-island transportation, so we booked a "high-speed" boat from Santorini to Mykonos.  What was almost comical is that everyone on the boat was sun burned and passed out.  The water around Santorini was pretty calm, conversly Mykonos is known to have really choppy water.  So as we approached Mykonos on our high speed Catamaran, we hit some rocky water and about 10% of the passengers ran to the bathroom as they got sea sick.  The security for the whole operation was alarmingly relaxed as they chucked our bags in one big heap when we got on and let us sort it out when we got off with out a glance of any sort.  The whole thing was an experience in itself.

rugged, hidden beach
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Mykonos is a little more developed than most of the other islands. The main town, Mykonos town, is made up of a lot of smaller streets that were built in a maze-like fashion to confuser invaders, needless to say it can get a little confusing for dumb tourists like me.  The architecture is similar to Santorini where all the buildings are white with blue ridges.  It also has 4 pelicans which serve as the island mascots.  Basically they go out to the beach during the day and walk into the city at night.  There they get surounded by sophisticated tourists like us who get their picture taken (once I get the picture I will post it).....and they wander into the kithcens of the restaurants where it is understood that the cooks will give them something to eat, usually fish.  If this sounds bizzare...well it is, but the locals have seemingly incorporated this in their way of life as just another 4 people.

spring break at paradise beach
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Starting from Santorini our sleep schedule got so out of whack that we were leaving our hostels around 3 pm, hit the beaches or whatever, dinner and then go out till the break of dawn.  Unlike Santorini though, besides the nightlife and the beaches there isn't too much to do. What is kind of inconvenient is that the main clubs and beaches are at least 20 minutes away by bus, and the roads to get there are winding and treacherous.  Apparently you can rent scooters to get down there, but that ends up as bad as it sounds (one fellow American who was a bar tender for the summer claimed atleast 25 people die a year on their way to the beach and back).  So what ends up happening is that everyone takes the bus down during the day, takes the bus on the way back, cleans up, and then takes the bus down again to hit up the clubs.  I thought the boat on the way here was a comical sight....until I got on this bus.

The main party beach is Paradise beach and Super Paradise beach, which is the family and gay beach (not that there is anything wrong with that).  Paradise beach, starting around 2-3 would start to fill up, and at 6 everyone would crowd around the beach bars where they would play some music.  And then they would head back to their hotels.  (We did end up finding a couple of the less crowded beaches, which were great.)

We stayed at a family run hostel where there were a ton of people like us who were travelling through and our age.  Three Austrialians (aussies), 2 people from Finland, three Germans, and 1 Brazillian.  We also had a little courtyard where everyone would meet up before going out, which made for some funny conversations.  (Apparently Australian people don't EVER drink Fosters beer but do EVERYTHING else, Finnish people love Vodka, the Germans were really into Yoga and the Brazillian rolled the "rr's" like they were going out of style).   One night we hit the big club in town called "Space" which was OK. The Italians were out in full force and were a little annoying due to their World Cup win....not unlike Yankee fans fresh off World Series win.  The clubs at the beaches were pretty cool.  They were on the beach, extraordinarily large, indoor and out door, and had DJ's who were supposedly world famous and on tour, but we couldn't tell.

All in all it was OK.  I felt I stayed there a little too long as it was quite expensive with the dollar down compared to the euro, and it was a little light on any sort of unique experiences.   But it was still fun and we hardly ever ran into the gay scene  (not that there is anything wrong with that).