July Newsletter - Travel

Rhodes, Greece

Ever since we had to cancel our planned trip to the Peloponnese last October, we have been searching for a good opportunity to get away and take a vacation in our beloved Greece. And in the midst of a very-welcomed slew of shows in June, we succeeded in finding a full 7 days and nights where we were free – and took off for one of the islands that we had been wanting to visit… Rhodes. Here are some of the highlights of this most delightful trip. (We took over 1400 photos – it was hard to choose which ones NOT to include here, the memories are ALL so amazing!)

We arrived midday on Sunday, got to the hotel and headed straight for the famous port area, where the Colossus of Rhodes is reputed to have stood over the harbor - as tall as the Statue of Liberty! Erected in 280 BCE, it only stood there for 54 years, until it was destroyed by an earthquake. We had a delicious lunch and walked around this lovely marina for a few hours.

Next day, we drove to the medieval city of Old Town Rhodes, and spent most of the day there seeing the sites, including the Evreon Martyron Square, an ancient synagogue and Jewish museum, a luxurious knights’ palace and lots more.

We took a drive down the coast towards one of the most famous sites on the island – the Acropolis of Lindos. Climbing to the top, the view was simply breathtaking. We also roamed around the lovely Village of Lindos, with all its typical narrow, white-washed alleyways and tourist shops.

After that, we stopped at a place that we found on Tripadvisor, which was described as a nature and folklore museum – without high expectations we came to a real gem of a place! The owner took us on a guided tour of the small museum which was meticulously laid out with artifacts and memorabilia that his family had been collecting for the past three generations. It was an amazing experience – totally not what we expected.

Our next stop was at a lovely spot called the Seven Springs, or in Greek “Epta Piges”. There was a highly recommended taverna right at the entrance to the springs site, and we had a delicious meal there, with peacocks strutting around the restaurant! (Picture a place that somewhat resembles the style of Dag-Al-HaDan, only on the wooded slopes of a beautiful stream.) After lunch, we strolled around the springs, which included a scary-looking foot tunnel that runs for 200 meters under the mountain with water that reportedly starts ankle-height but towards the end reaches almost to the hips – not for us!! We walked over the hill to the exit of the tunnel and on toward the waterfall.

Back near the hotel, we stopped at a mini-Aquarium (as the owner called it) that had an amazing story – every morning, the owner goes down to the fishing port where they drag in the nets full of fish they catch. Many of the fish are not edible, so they often leave them to die on the docks, or throw some back into the water, no matter how severely injured they may be. The museum owner wades through the catch and finds all the creatures that are not being sold to restaurants, collects them, brings them back to his aquarium and nurtures them back to health. When they are ready, he releases them back into the sea! (Somehow, he even had a type of Piranha in one of his tanks!)

The next day, after some more sightseeing in Old Town Rhodes and lunch at a lovely seaside restaurant, we walked around an urban park called Rodini Park. We read that it was the oldest landscaped urban park in all of Europe – and probably the world, dating back to Roman times. There’s even a bit of an aqueduct still there.

The following day was our longest ride when we drove completely around the island. We stopped at two amazing castles that were built on mountain tops (a bit of a climb, but with breathtaking views of the sea)-  the Kritinia Castle and the famous Monolithos Castle.

And by the way, we say we drove all the way around the island – here is a correctly scaled map of Rhodes, in comparison to Israel. All the way around the island is about the same as driving from Tel Aviv to Haifa and back.

After descending the mountain from Monolithos, we drove to a delightfully secluded beach called the Limni Beach – the stones of that beach were absolutely beautiful!

Mindy loves deserted buildings – she feels they are all so creepy and fascinating. So when we read about a number of these spots, we set our sights on visiting them – including an old silk factory, a marketplace, a sanitorium, and a police station, plus an AMAZING villa that was built deep in the woods on the top of a mountain as a private residence for Mussolini himself! They were all deserted in the 1940s.

We stopped in front of a monastery that had a huge, hollow tree (below is a picture of us INSIDE the tree), wandered around a lovely park called the Valley of the Butterflies (in season, the place is supposed to be absolutely swarming with butterflies – now we just saw a mere few thousand of them), and visited a Bee Museum (it’s also a honey factory that has won international awards, including a Guinness World Record!).

We had lunch at a restaurant owned by two young people – she was from Italy (named Mara), and he – from Kiryat Ono! And that’s where they got the name of the restaurant from!

There’s lots more to show and tell, but this has been a long enough post, don’t you think? Just to wrap it up, we wanted to give a shout out for the hotel we stayed at – a small, VERY clean hotel with the NICEST family you can imagine running it. And aside from hosting tourists, they also host two adorable pets – Habibi, the sweet dog, and a so-far unnamed very adventurous kitten who always joined us for breakfast.

There’s a small (as in, VERY small) pool, but we still enjoyed our smoothies lounging around next to it – even cooling off in it once. And aside from running a hotel, they also run a lovely neighborhood supermarket – the hotel front desk and the supermarket cashier counter are a few feet away from each other.

We’d happily visit again, and we definitely recommend staying at the John & Mary’s Studios Hotel, if you are inspired to visit Rhodes. Tell Nikos and family that Larry & Mindy sent you!