Dolly In ... Milos | Part Two

So, the reason I had to make a second post about Milos is because we took a boat trip. Not just any boat trip, but a 10 hour, round-the-island, catered boat trip. It was incredible. We all agreed it was probably the best day of our lives. 

The trip started at 10am and left from the main port of Milos. Throughout the day we were given delicious snacks including homemade bruschetta, local peaches, sandwiches, Greek salad and a spaghetti lunch. We were also treated to unlimited drinks; coke, lemonade, beer, wine and of course water.  

The trip revealed things about Milos that we'd have had no idea about if we hadn't taken it, from fishing towns that are uninhabited in the winter months, to geological wonders. We saw things that you wouldn't have believed (if I hadn't taken photos). At various points during the day the boat stopped and allowed us to explore beaches and coves (inaccessible by road) from the water. It was sooooo much fun, especially because they provided snorkelling equipment and flippers! 

This is a famous rock in Milos because from one angle it looks like a rabbit, and from another it looks like a bear. Cool eh?

These rock formations were incredible. It's something to do with the volcanic activity around and beneath the island. I have no idea who this man is, but he will now be forever immortalised on this blog. 

One of the factors that sold this particular trip to us was the fact that an underwater camera was involved, and that we'd be able to keep the pictures! No surprise then that we took over 100 photos!

Mmm how sexy do I look in a snorkel? I only put this picture in because the reflection makes it look like I have antennae.

I thought I'd finish with this picture because the water was literally that blue! We took a lot of photos of our legs, and they were all pretty rubbish, but at least in this one most of us look human.

Read Part One here.

Dolly In ... Milos | Part One

OMG, photos of people!? On Dolly's blog? Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you, that's me up there with my friends. I realised that these Dolly In ... posts were getting a bit samey, so I decided it was about time I introduced some photos of people. We loved Milos! At first we thought that 5 days there might be too much, but in fact we wouldn't have been able to fit in all the fantastic stuff we did if we hadn't stayed there for that long (hence part one and two). 

I love this picture (slash the 20+ photos I took of this scene) because I think it looks like a band portrait. The great lighting mixed with the gorgeous location and lack of people, to me, made a great photo. I took this in a place called Plaka which is the main town on Milos. Like most places we visited, Plaka was deserted during the day and came (slightly more) alive after dark. As you can see, we enjoyed a fantastic sunset, probably the best of the entire trip, up in Plaka. 

Ok yes, that is what you think it is, it's a chocolate fondue with ICE CREAM! We dipped ice cream into melted chocolate! Just take a second to get your head around that. OK? Cool, let's continue. We'd had a bit of an off day (as you do), and so, to treat ourselves, we went to this really cool looking ice cream shop that had an inconceivable number of available flavours. As we went to grab a table, we noticed that everyone seemed to have ordered the same thing, a chocolate fondue. It was only on further inspection of the menu though that we realised how ice cream was involved. €5 each seemed a bit steep, but after we'd devoured it, we all agreed that it had been the best €5 we ever spent. 

As the guy in our hostel kept reminding us, Milos has thirty two beaches, and all of them are completely different. This one you can see above was my favourite beach of the whole trip, Sarakiniko.

Sarakiniko was the weirdest place I think I've ever been, it looked like a set from Star Trek. The walk down to the beach was between startlingly bright white hills that eventually open up onto a narrow area of sand. The water is very shallow in this inlet, but once you swim out of it, it's deep enough to be able to jump off rocks. Which I did! The rocks at the entrance of the inlet also caused a natural wave pool to form at the side. Obviously I spent a long time in there. 

We also managed to get to the hot springs on the island, even though there was no bus and they were incredibly poorly signposted. It was the first time I've been in anything like that and it was awesome. You just swim out into the sea, and it gets hotter! It's a bit like a jacuzzi, as the heat is caused by bubbles of sulphur. Ok yes, it did smell a bit, and it dyed my friends' beautiful white swimming costume a bit orangey, but I think it was worth it. 

That's all for this post, but look out for Part Two where I'll be talking all about the boat trip we took around the island.

Dolly In ... Ios

Look at that sunset. Look at it! THAT was the view from our hostel room. We stayed at a place called Francesco's, and it was fantastic! They had a pool that looked out over the town and port, a bar where we met some really fun people, great rooms and housekeeping (!), and all the staff were awesome, especially the guy who drove us to the port at 7am even though he didn't start work till 9.

We only got to one beach on the island, called Mylopotas, and it was gorgeous (as you can see from the photo below). Even better than that, it was deserted when we got there! It was like having our own private beach, except for the hot American guy, who obviously shaved his chest, who came over to talk to us. We walked to the beach down the steepest hill I've ever seen (yep, in your face Constitution Hill!). Thankfully we made the last bus back.

Ios is known as the party island, and boy oh boy was it. About a five minute walk from our hostel took us to the town that during the day was deserted. On our first day we though we'd just chosen to stay on a really unpopular island, but then, we went out at night. At night the streets are throbbing with people drinking at bars waiting for the clubs to open (which they don't do till 3am!). We went to one particular bar where you buy a €5 drink, and then get hit over the head with an object of your choice. Of course you wear a helmet, but still, being hit with a bar stool, a skateboard, a hammer, or even the bar tenders' foot, is pretty wild. We of course paid for our friend to do it ;)

Overall, Ios was fantastic, and we've all agreed that we need to go back there ASAP. There were only three of us on the trip at that point, and although we still had a butt load of fun, as the saying goes, the more the merrier. I would definitely recommend Ios to everyone, young or old, up for a party, or wanting to lounge on the beach all day. It was a really pretty island that was not rammed with tourists. 

P.S. it's pronounced eee-os.

Dolly In ... Mykonos

We only got to spend two days in Mykonos due to the weird nature of the ferries, but we did manage to get a real feel for the place.

We stayed in a place called Paraga Beach Camping, a campsite that was literally on the beach. We stayed in a 'tent' that looked a bit like a bunker and only had one plug socket (ahh!). The hostel, considering how cheap it was, was fantastic. It had a pool and a restaurant where my two friends said they had their best meal of the holiday! So ... highly recommended!

All over Greece there were these bakeries that sold the most amazing selection of cream cakes. They all looked sooooo delicious. 

These few pictures are from the town of Mykonos that was so pretty. We even went so far as to say we preferred it to Santorini. 

As you can see, I'm not the best at night time photography, because I have incredibly shaky hands, and no tripod. We ended up spending ages trying to get a good picture of the town at night and, to be honest, failing miserably. In the end we decided just to go with it.

Dolly In ... Greece

So ...  I'm back! I just flew back from Greece yesterday afternoon, have caught up on the two new episodes of The Mindy Project and slept. Sorry for not posting in over a week; I scheduled a weeks worth of posts (| | | |) before I went away, and assumed I'd have access to a computer while I was away to write some stuff for last week, but no. No computers. Worse than that, Wi-Fi was pretty sporadic too. There were a few times when I wasn't able to load Mindy Kaling's instagram feed all day!

Wi-Fi aside, this was probably the best holiday I've ever been on, even if it was slightly bittersweet. I was in Greece for three weeks (!) with my closest university friends, who I've lived with for the past three years. This holiday was planned as a kind of last hurrah, the longest holiday we'll probably be able to take together in a long time, what with us becoming adults and needing to get jobs and what not. 

The same group of us went Interrailing in 2012, and although we had a really great time doing that, we all agreed that the level of stress on that holiday was not one we wanted to recreate. Having not booked our trains, or even our hostels in advance, we were constantly on edge, worrying about where we were going to stay and if we were going to make our trains (usually we didn't).With that in mind, for our trip to Greece, we decided to book all the ferries and hostels in advance, and boy did this make things easier (and probably significantly cheaper). 

We started our trip in Athens, where I'd actually been before when I was about 14, and spent a day exploring the city and taking advantage of the free walking tour (thanks to our guide George!). We then visited some amazing Greek islands: Mykonos, Ios, Milos (| |) and Santorini, finishing our trip in Rhodes. I'm going to be posting about each of the islands individually over the next few weeks, as I took way too many pictures to put into one post. I'll review the places we went, and recommend accommodation, restaurants and day trips. 

I hope everyone's having a great September so far, just in case you need perking up, here are the two (1 2) tracks we literally played on repeat through the holiday. A weird mix I know.

Five Things I've Learned as a Lone Female Traveller

So, as you may have noticed, I just came back from spending a couple of weeks travelling alone. I did meet up with some friends in Slovenia, but the majority of the two weeks was spent in my own company. I'd wanted to travel on my own for a long time, I was even considering getting the working visa for Australia which would mean being alone on the other side of the world for at least a year! Now that I've done it for two weeks, I think I can say that I've got rid of the bug (wimp much?). Now these are just my opinions on the subject, I've read lots of these types of posts where people think the complete opposite, but I'm just sharing what I think. It is my blog after all. 

I've decided to discuss five topics that I think people worry about when travelling alone, as well as some things I just wanted to talk about. This is a very text heavy post ... enjoy!

1. Selfies

While I was away I had to work really hard to perfect the art of the selfie. Most of my early ones are 90% my face, 10% blurry landmark in the background. I was a bit too nervous to ask people to take photos of me, because my camera cost me a lot of money, and I would not forgive myself if I'd got it stolen, and because I'm awful at posing for pictures, and doing it for strangers, just urgh. So I think I managed to get some OK photos of myself, but I have to admit I would have preferred to have a  friend or a family member there to take the photograph for me. 

The picture on the left is one of my first attempts at a selfie at Lake Bled. The background is blurred, even my face is blurred! You can just about make out the church on the island above my sunglasses. Altogether a pretty awful photo. The one on the right, although not much better, is in focus, and you can clearly see a gondola. I still haven't mastered getting my whole face in the frame, but that's something to work on in future. (Fun fact: that necklace on the right is the one I talk about here.)

2. Creeps

I spent a week in Italy, and didn't encounter a single overly flirtatious male. Whether this is because I'm not the type of gal people mean when they tell you that Italians are creepy towards women, I'm over six foot, with blue hair, and I'm not exactly model thin, I didn't really experience any of this in Italy. Paris on the other hand! OMFG. I got off the train at Paris Est and had to walk over to Gare Du Nord, it's about a five minute walk, but as I hadn't been there before I had to find a map. If the back and front backpack hadn't given it away already, I really was identifying myself as a tourist. Not that this gives anyone the right to approach me the way this guy did, or any way for that matter. 

I'd been on the train for 3 hours and was already pretty exhausted and sweaty, so when a guy came up to me talking in French I assumed he was asking for directions or something, not anything untoward. So, I explained that I didn't speak French and walked off. Next thing I know, I'm walking down a side street in Paris and the same little guy popped up next to me (he was only about 5'5, so I wasn't as scared as I could've been. Worst came to worst I could have rammed him with my backpack and run away). He was still rambling in French and I kept saying I didn't understand, and he kept talking. Next thing he starts talking and I hear the word hotel. Now I was freaking out that I had Taken situation on my hands. This guy wanted to follow me to my hotel and kidnap me. So, panicked, I tried to explain I was getting the train.

'Gare Du Nord. Gare Du Nord. Le train'

So then the guy, still talking about hotels starts tapping my arm. I look down and he's making sexual gestures (don't really know how else to put it) and saying hotel. He was pointing up to a hotel we were passing and putting his finger into a ring he'd made with his other hand! I properly freaked out then and started speaking really loudly so other people would hear, we were finally getting close to the station so it was getting busier. I just said 'Oh my god. No thanks. Bye.' I then walked really fast to the station and he tried to grab my arm again by I just kept going and thank god he left.

I hadn't been to Paris before, but that experience has put me off completely! I had about three hours to explore between trains, but I was too stunned/scared after that to do anything more than sit on the platform and read. So that was a pretty bad experience, thankfully it was on my way home so it didn't ruin the rest of my holiday or anything. 

(With regards to the picture, surprisingly I didn't take my camera out and snap a picture of any creeps, so I thought I'd post this picture of a child feeding pigeons because I probably looked like a creep taking it.)

3. Dining Alone

This seems to be an issue for a lot of people, but I have to admit, I have no problem whatsoever eating in a restaurant on my own. OK, it is a tad harder to do it abroad as there is always a slight language barrier, but to be honest, I kind of enjoy it. I love food, and so really there is nothing that's gonna get in the way of me and my dinner. I ate in several restaurants and cafes on my trip, from one on the island in the middle of Lake Bled to a pizzeria overlooking the Grand Canal. 

If eating in a restaurant alone sounds like your worst nightmare though, there are ways to avoid it. My budget was not unlimited, so I didn't have the money to eat in restaurants every day. On the days where I didn't I'd either grab a snack from the supermarket to eat on the go, or pick up some pasta and sauce to eat at my hostel. Eating in your hostel can also be a pretty good way to meet people. Depending on the size of the shared kitchen, and indeed the hostel, you may well be cooking at the same time as some of the other residents. If like me though you hate talking to strangers, you can also plan ahead to avoid cooking at the same time as other people. 

4. Meeting People

If on your solo travels you wish to meet people, there are countless opportunities to do so. I stayed in dorms for my entire trip, meaning I had about 30 potential friends right there. Granted, you will have to be a bit forward with people, as many people are travelling in groups, and may not see the need to approach and talk to other people. But they don't do this to be rude, they just may not realise you are alone and looking for people to hang out with. If dorms aren't for you, most hostels have shared kitchens, if not a bar. These are great places to meet people and get to know them in quite a relaxed, pressure-free environment. Also, if you don't get on with them, they're not sleeping in the same room as you! 

If you're foregoing hostels altogether but still want to meet travellers, there's still a million ways to do so. I went on a few free walking tours, the first stop for backpackers and cheap students, and got talking to some really nice people. These tours are usually carried out in several languages, so you'll definitely meet some people you can communicate with. Bar Crawls are also a good place to start, hostels tend to have leaflets about these, but you can also find out information online. 

Finally, if you're inter-railing, like I was, you are more than likely to get chatting to people on trains. These people will most likely be fellow travellers, possibly heading to and coming from the same places you are. This'll give you automatic conversation topics. Quite a lot of european trains have compartments for six people. These compartments are quite cosy, so if you're spending four or five hours in one with someone, it's likely that you'll have to say a few words to them. I met quite a few people on trains, from a scout coordinator from New Zealand, to a guy travelling to Dubrovnik for a friends' wedding, to a pregnant woman and her partner, who'd lived in Finsbury Park and kept offering me cake! 

Alternatively, if you hate meeting new people, and the whole point of your travelling solo was to get away from everything and have some me-time, then it's pretty easy to do that too. A quick 'hello, how are you?' here and there can be polite, but you're never going to see these people again, so ignoring anyone and everyone is just as good a tactic as any.

 5. Finding Things To Do

I thrive on my own company, in fact, sometimes I crave it. I'm an only child, so growing up I spent a lot of time getting used to being alone. That being said, I thought I'd be fine travelling alone, never for one second did I think I could get bored. But I was wrong. I think in part it was the way I'd organised my holiday, only spending a short amount of time in each city put pressure on having days packed with sightseeing and fun. Because of this I felt guilty doing things I enjoy, like reading, and writing for this blog, because I felt that I was wasting my time in whichever beautiful city I was currently in. When I start to feel like this it does not work in my favour. I didn't then go out and try to squeeze everything in, instead I curled up in my hostel bed and watched The Following on my phone. 

All in all I enjoyed my time away, and am glad I travelled alone, even if it was the first and (possibly) only time.

P.S. I'm actually going on holiday tomorrow, this time with friends, so wont be around for a couple of weeks. Don't worry, I've got posts scheduled, but wont have the best internet access while I'm away.