greecey perfection. the best spring break we ever could have imagined. all we had was a plane and a hostel for a week on a random greek island we knew nothing about. and from there... we just let life happen.
rhodes is one of the biggest greek islands. such a chill place. we stayed in a village called haraki that was literally just a quarter mile strip of beach and a few houses and shops. plus it's not tourist season yet so most places were closed. we stayed in haraki mare apartments which was lovely. we had a cute little loft only 50 feet away from the beach. run by stella and eleftheria- the most hospitable sisters you'll ever find. and we were actually the only tourists in all of haraki. therefore we befriended the locals. the only bar/restaurant open was haraki dreams owned by a lovely man named mike. friends with bartenders= big connections and free drinks and crepes.
mike's bar
orange festival. the first full day we were there we walked a couple miles to another village that was holding an orange festival. we didn't really know what that meant but man was it worth it. so greek. music and dancing and free food. we were obviously the only non-greeks. we just sat for hours and took it all in. there was a stage where greek performers in cool costumes would dance. on the ground, impromptu dance circles would form when popular songs came on. people would just gather and dance and they all knew the steps. i was sitting in my seat trying to learn the footwork. got some down. mostly we just sat and creeped. and took pics.
orange festival
greek dancers
several days were spent doing absolutely nothing. waking up whenever we woke up and laying on the beach all day. so relaxing. no agenda no plans. just straight chilling. we hiked up the rocks by our beach one day. i can't get over how beautiful greece is. like untouched natural beauty. it's my kind of place. blue skies and clear water doesn't hurt either. watched movies on my computer at night. read. wrote. talked. ate. we needed this.
rhodes from the mountain
lindos. another village by haraki of whitewashed houses. the way i picture greece. we walked around and went in a bunch of shops. explored. took pics. laughed. ate gyros. decided we wanted to ride donkeys up this hill to this castle thing called acropolis. lo and i got on our donkeys and ju was behind us. next thing we knew ju's donkey was running away and the guy was not holding the reigns. her donkey ran most of the way up the hill with her bouncing all over and lo and i dying laughing behind her. worth it. walked back down from the hill and wandered around more. very cool little village.
overlooking lindos
riding donkeys
one night at mike's bar a guy walked in who we recognized as a performer from the orange festival. so we talked to him a bit. and the next night ended up at his bar in the next village. his name is spiros and he is loads of fun. we danced and sang all night at his bar with him and had a blast. the next day he took us into rhodes town and we walked around and did more exploring. he's a local so he knew all the sweet places. and he took us to all of them. he was so nice and went far out of his way to make sure we had a great time. which we did. he even took us into this secret cave in the side of the mountain next to our apartment. so fun. we hung out with him and his friend angelos for the rest of the trip. they were great. greek friends. legit.
rhodes old town
girls and spiros
the last night we were at mike's with a bunch of retired british couples. hilarious. we played bingo. i won a lollipop. everyone made fun of me for picking the lollipop over a bottle of wine. whatever i know what i want. then i won again with a full board but gave it to ju so she could be a winner too. we won 14 euro! and used it to cover our drinks and crepes. sang karaoke with a hilarious woman who we dubbed barb. very drunk. very into karaoke. not very sure of the words. ever. we laughed for about 3 hours straight that night. life is so funny. we definitely left haraki with a bang.
me and my winning lollipop
so overall i would say it was the best spring break ever. better than we'd imagined. i hope i travel like this for the rest of my life. and live. life is good. god is great.
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