The Skiathos Bulletin Board

skidsy · Joined: 01 May 2006 Posts: 550 Location: Wirral.

OK I did eating, beaches and the weather so here is the rest...

Accom. Stayed at Noula Apartments in Koukounaries. As usual, very nice, clean and the one problem we had in the kids bathroom with the shower was fixed the same day. We even arrived home with a supply of the families olive oil from their trees up at Kastro.

What to do...
The first full day of the holiday started overcast with sun breaking through later. This was OK as having a couple of fair skins and freckles in the family it gave us time to adjust. Due to a computer crash I knew I had booked a jeep from Nikos at Victoria but couldn't remember how long for and when. Rolling Eyes

I arranged a lift into Troulos the next day....Of course the next day was blisteringly hot and I arrived in Troulos to find I had arranged a jeep for the Sunday for 7 days....missed the bus on the way back and couldn't get a cab as Friday is change over day and they didn't want to know.
I decided to walk and just short of the Atrium Hotel the next bus whizzed by, it's a good job I knew there was a short cut down the steps outside the Skiathos Palace across the Koukounaries car park and Strofilia. Not a bad stroll really.
Saturday we decided to spend a day on Koukounaries beach and Sunday the jeep arrived. The weather was grey and blustery and the delivery driver told me to expect heavy rain so we trundled up to the dogs home. I couldn't quite believe the devastation from the fire which you can see really well from there, the fire had also accelerated the use of the new tip and the dust generated from the wagons outside the home has made it really unbearable. Still, we walked some of the doggies down past the monastary and along the road overlooking Asselinos. Unfortunately on the way back up one of the little dogs decided it had had enough and my wife had to carry it back.
On Sunday evening it absolutely poured down but Monday looked to be a bit brighter so we went to Banana initially before going to Ambelakia. After about an hour it clouded over and looked like rain so we decided to go into town...with everyone else.
I've never seen a traffic queue on Skiathos before but the one into town was at least 50 cars strong all following the bus. Our host decided at Megali Amos that he had crawled along for long enough and overtook a line of about 30 cars. Being English we pulled in for lunch instead at the Poseidon and watched another torrential downpour before deciding to not bother going into town and went back to Koukounaries instead.
The weather picked up after that and we made use of the 4x4 to visit Evangelistra which finally looks finished, Platanos for lunch on a couple of days...stuffed squid was just unbelievable, Mandraki and a couple of shopping trips into town. We also went to Troulos to the Thanos complex to see Stavros and had a meal there one night. He was on top form as usual telling us great stories about his floods last year.
The rest of the holiday was spent at Ambelakia beach apart from taking a horse trek over the dirt road overlooking Mandraki and taking a ride on something called the crazy squib.
This is basically an inflatable sofa pulled at high speed behind a speedboat whilst you hang on for dear life. A tip from me is that you should go on it with at least three other adults as then it doesn't take off and fly at 90 degrees behind the boat which I found it does when you are accompanied by a less than heavy teenage child. She loved it whilst I had to change my shorts afterwards.

Apart from the whingeing on my other post we had a great time as usual and are looking to go for the whole of the school holidays next year independent of the tour operators. If anyone is going to Ambelakia this year please say hello to Marissa from me..the one with the strange name (Ian - yes really) who bought her the Athens News.

patsy · Joined: 07 Feb 2006 Posts: 930 Location: sussex

hi skidsy,great write-up,when you said "the squid was just unbelievable" did you mean good or bad ?? i hate squid (texture is rubbery) you were very lucky you had a couple of downpours, i love it when it comes down in buckets, so exciteing!! i prayed for it to rain in may 2006, but it did not appear for two whole weeks in temp 34 centigrade. i dont think you were whinging in part 1 you were being honest,which i like. when someone says they enjoyed every moment of their holiday, call me sadistic!! but i also like to hear about things that went wrong ,eg: getting off the bus and falling down a ditch !! some of those things are funny,or have i got a warped sense of humour ?? he he .

skidsy · Joined: 01 May 2006 Posts: 550 Location: Wirral.

[quote="patsy"]hi skidsy,great write-up,when you said "the squid was just unbelievable" did you mean good or bad ?? [quote]

It was wonderful, possibly the best squid dish I have ever had. Sadly it was a one off and they didn't do it the second time we went up there.