Go Greece:With tourist numbers down, there are rich rewards for holidaymakers willing to run the gauntlet of industrial unrest in Greece, writes Gretchen Friemann
THE MOOD IN our taxi cab was murderous. We had been cooped up in this sweltering, antiquated car for over an hour, as our driver weaved laboriously through Athens’s gridlocked road system. And now, suddenly, we had stopped. Ahead of us, in the heat haze of the midday sun, stretched an almighty traffic jam.
The driver turned the engine off, defeated. For a brief moment nobody moved. Nobody spoke; there was not a wisp of a breeze in the air.
Then all hell broke loose. My 15-month-old son, furious at my efforts to keep him somewhere in the vicinity of my lap, emitted a volley of high-pitched screams, writhed violently in my arms and began to turn an alarming shade of purple. My three-year-old, not to be out done, shrieked loudly and demanded to go to the toilet, immediately.
In the front seat, removed from the pandemonium in the back, my husband tapped frenetically at his phone in a last-ditch effort to reschedule our ferry tickets.
We were about 10km outside of Rafina, the capital’s second largest port. Our ferry to the Cyclades Islands was leaving in 30 minutes, precisely the same amount of time our driver estimated it would take to advance through the traffic jam.
Later, over a glass of wine on the terrace of our deserted, luxury hotel overlooking the Aegean, and with our marital solidarity somewhat restored, we debated whether the spectacular discount we had just negotiated on our accommodation was worth the stress and chaos involved in reaching it. The traffic gridlock to the port was the result of an impending 24-hour ferry strike, and so a taxi ride which helpful hotel staff in Athens assured us would take no longer than 40 minutes took more than double that time as hordes of holidaymakers scrambled to reach the city’s main ports ahead of a nationwide shutdown.
But then this is a country on the brink of bankruptcy. As the Greeks grapple with painful austerity measures – including swingeing cuts in wages and pensions – widespread work stoppages, impromptu strikes, and the occasional protest or sit-in have become commonplace.
And it is usually impossible to plan for these disruptions, as during this week’s riots or last week when members of two labour unions affiliated with the Communist Party blocked the boarding ramps of ferries around Athens for two days in protest at the economic reforms.
IN AN EFFORT TOsalvage the nation's stricken tourism industry, which is already reeling from the deadly May 5th riots in Athens as well as from the fallout from the volcano in Iceland, the Greek government has pledged to compensate holidaymakers for any delays incurred by industrial disputes or natural disasters.
But for many in this sector it is already too late. The tourism industry generates 20 per cent of the country’s income but holiday bookings are down by 10 per cent, and some newspaper reports suggest the slippage may be twice that figure – a disaster for many Greek islanders, whose incomes are disproportionately dependent upon the sun-seeker traffic and whose crucial summer earning season has now been radically reduced by the political and economic strife. All of which means there are rich rewards in store for holidaymakers willing to run the gauntlet of this industrial unrest. For it’s not just cheaper accommodation on offer. The real boon is the virtually empty, idyllic beaches.
In early June, on the massive Kionia beach, one of the most popular on the Cycladic island of Tinos, we counted a Greek family of five and two couples. So here we all were, in thrilling isolation, paddling away in the warm Aegean Sea. Ahead of us a vast flat sheet of shimmering turquoise; above us a cloudless blue sky.
The locally produced guidebook to the island described Kionia as full of “sand, deckchairs, and action”. Thankfully, we didn’t experience any of the latter. But the beach was littered with row upon row of sun loungers which, stripped of their income-generating cushions, added to an atmosphere of almost eerie abandonment.
Across the road from the beach stand the scant ruins of a temple to Poseidon, the Greek god of the sea, and his beautiful water nymph wife, Amphitrite. The mythical deities were worshipped by the islanders after Poseidon, according to one myth anyway, sent a flock of storks to rid Tinos of its excessive snake population. Happily however, we can attest to the snakes’ power of survival since we spotted three road kills and one live specimen on our frequent jaunts around the island’s rugged, hilly interior.
IN FACT A GOODchunk of our trip to Tinos was spent in the car, driving from one picturesque beach to another, thanks to the lack of any relationship-enhancing childcare facilities on offer at the hotel.
Despite its proximity to the jet setters’ playground of Mykonos, a mere 15-minute ferry ride away, Tinos remains very much under-developed and so resort-style accommodation is non-existent.
This, of course, is part of its charm. But while the island is off the beaten track for foreign visitors, it usually attracts a steady flow of Greek tourists, who come here in their droves throughout the summer, thanks largely to the 19th century discovery of a religious icon which transformed Tinos into the Greek Orthodox equivalent of Lourdes.
Yet even the multitudes of cafes and tavernas that line the old port in the island’s main town, seemed to be doing a pretty slack trade and in the upmarket Hotel Anthia, we were the only guests for most of our five-day stay.
To our surprise, Mykonos also seemed strangely subdued. Although the famous, labyrinthine streets of the Hora, the island’s port and capital, can feel nauseatingly claustrophobic once a cruise ship arrives and disgorges enough passengers to fill the offices of the IFSC three times over, most businesses connected to the tourist trade, and there are few that aren’t, appear to be feeling the pinch.
“The season is definitely shrinking,” explains Maria, an efficient, friendly Austrian who spends six months of the year managing one of the many pricey hotels in and around the Hora. In common with most islanders, she works a seven-day week during her summer stint in Mykonos but questions whether she will have sufficient work to justify returning next year. Over the past decade, the five-and-a-half-month key summer earning period has dwindled to three months and Maria believes this window is likely to narrow even further in the wake of the current crisis.
CERTAINLY, THEfurther we ventured from Mykonos town, the main attraction of this island and one of the most photographed spots in Greece, the sparser the tourist numbers became. On one memorably hot day, we threw the children into the car, hopeful this would send them to sleep for at least an hour, and set off for the well-known beaches of Kalo Livadi and Kalafatis, but to our astonishment we found them empty, the plastic awnings on the surrounding cafes fluttering noisily in the wind, which unlike the holidaymakers, remains an inescapable constant throughout the Cyclades.
Clearly this was all very much out of the ordinary. Lonely Planet’s guide to Greece warns that Mykonos’ beaches are “extremely popular and busy from June onwards”. But even the heavily-developed resort beach of Ornos, 4km outside of Mykonos town and described by Lonely Planet as “packed and noisy”, was fairly sedate, allowing us to negotiate a 40 per cent discount on a junior suite at the four-star Hotel Deliades, a comparatively new complex which straggles over a steep cliff at the far end of the bay.
Seven days later, on the return two-and-a-half-hour ferry to Athens, we were ready to dismiss the frenetic journey out as nothing more than a mild inconvenience. That was before a train strike forced us to sit through one final, hair-raising taxi ride to Athens airport.
Where to stay and eat
Where to stay Tinos
Hotel Anthia. See anthia.gr. Doubles from €150.
Tinion Hotel in the main town. See tinionhotel.gr. Doubles from €55.
Porto Tango hotel. See portotango.gr. About a 20-minute drive from the main town, it has hosted some of Greece’s top politicians. Rates by email application only.
Where to eat Tinos
As over 90 per cent of visitors to Tinos are Greek, sumptuous home cooked food is hard to avoid. Try the pork and rosemary dish at To Koutouki, tucked away in a laneway behind the main promenade of the old port.
Windmills Travel, an agency specialising in Greece, has an office in Tinos town and can organise car rental and accommodation. See windmillstravel.com.
Where to stay Mykonos
Hotel Deliades at Ornos beach. See deliades.com. Doubles from €140 in low season and from €240 throughout the months of July and August.
Mykonos Ammos hotel. Beachside option. See mykonosammoshotel.com. Doubles in low season from €80 and from €160 in July and August.
Hotel Belvedere. A five-star hotel where the international chef, Nobu, recently opened a restaurant. Doubles from €165 in the low season and from €400 in July and August.
Where to eat Mykonos
Ornos overflows with tavernas and cafes, but for consistently excellent, well-priced food – and situated directly on the beach too – head for Ithaka taverna.