I have already written a post outlining our thoughts on taking a holiday versus going travelling https://amidlifeadventure.org/2023/03/03/adventure-holidays-versus-travelling/
and to be honest didn’t really imagine back then I would be writing a part two but here I am sat on a sofa in an apartment in Crete doing just that!
2024 has been a tough year for us and whilst we had not originally planned to do any further travelling this year we also didn’t expect this year to unfold the way it has.
We had made the decision in September 2023 when we returned from our six months away that we would spend the next twelve months making real life decisions. Hubby retired in March 2023 when we set off so we really needed to find out:
1/ Can we live together full time now we are both retired?
2/ Can we live off the monthly pension allowance coming in every month in addition to putting money aside to continue our future travel plans?
3/ Did we want to remain in our current house or did we want to move out of the area in order to buy a property a bit more secluded and more to our ideal taste? Alternatively did we want to downsize in order to release capital from our current home and reduce our monthly bills?
4/ If we chose to stay what outlay was there going to be in order to deliver the home and garden we wanted for retirement?
The first reality check we had was the enormous and unexpected hangover we suffered when we returned from travelling. See my previous post:
https://amidlifeadventure.org/2023/09/29/real-life-when-the-trip-is-over/
Christmas came and went, then on New Year’s Eve we received a telephone call at 10 p.m. which catapulted us into 2024 with a bang. This was just the beginning of what turned into a constantly changing landscape where we were dealing with the unexpected on more than one occasion. Every member of our close family was touched by one issue or another.
Crete:
We decided, in order to give us some respite from what 2024 was constantly throwing at us, we would book a holiday to Crete for two weeks. I did little or no research into where we were going as this was a holiday and the plan was to relax.
Here we are on our final night of our two week holiday and what a rollercoaster it has been. In the last six years, not withstanding the time at home due to Covid, we have spent:
8 weeks road tripping around England and Scotland
4 weeks island hopping in Greece
3 months touring Western Europe by train then
3 months road tripping in the USA
I know, compared to some, we are still fairly new to this world but in flying out to Crete to actually stay in one place, relax around a pool in the sunshine for two weeks we didn’t really give our travelling experience a second thought. We’ve been away on holiday before so what can go wrong?
Do you remember the days before the “all inclusive holiday”?
I do. I remember spending many summer holidays in Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands when my children were small. The day would begin early with breakfast in our apartment, then the children would eagerly get in the pool. Happy to stay there all day, playing and making new but temporary friends I was left to switch off from work, relax, read and get a bit of a suntan.
Lunch would be back in the apartment and then in the evening we would all get showered and changed and go out for dinner. Exploring the local restaurants and cuisine was half of the fun of our holiday. My children grew up culturally more aware as a result and still happily try anything once.
We took a break from Fuerteventura in 2005 returningin 2010, as a bit of a final farewell to an island that my children saw as a second home where they fine tuned their conversational Spanish and made friends from another country.
Wow! what a difference in just a couple of years. Many of the small restaurants that had been favourite haunts had disappeared. They had fallen foul of the mass tourism, package holiday deals which were now all inclusive.
A new generation of children and teenagers were now coming through the “holiday abroad system” completely unaware of the culture of the land they were now in, as package deal hotels laid on breakfast, lunch and dinner, “eat as much as you want” at the buffet. Mum and Dad could also now drink all the local beer, wine and spirits they wanted all for one price paid in advance before you even step onto the plane!
This generation of teenagers are now parents themselves and thus the cycle continues with them bringing their children abroad on the same style of all inclusive holidays!
Whilst we are not booked on this type of holiday as we have used our holiday ownership to stay here, most of the other visitors are and it’s really quite weird watching this play out. It’s like they have transported themselves from one country to another and then just picked up their lives here. There doesn’t appear to be much interest in exploring the island, learning about ancient civilisations or understanding the Greek culture. There isn’t even much socialising.
Admittedly there are a lot more different nationalities than fifteen years ago but each family seems to remain within their own unit. I’m not seeing children playing in the pool together or making new holiday buddies. Even their parents seem to be keeping themselves to themselves. They just seem to want to exist within this bubble for a week (most only come for 7 days) and then return home showing everyone their wonderful tan and telling family and friends about their wonderful holiday.
Brits Abroad!
We arrived on a Friday and with two weeks stretching in front of us, we chilled out around the pool for a couple of days. We tried the “all you can eat” buffet” on the Friday night for dinner, the pool bar for lunch/dinner on the Saturday and then the buffet again for breakfast on the Sunday.
Our resort is high up on a hill, quite detached from humankind, with magnificent views across the nearby mountains and a free shuttle bus down to the local main town of Hersonissos running several times a day. So eager to explore we caught the bus down into town on Monday morning having no idea what to expect.
Making our way to the seafront we decided to walk along to the harbour. The narrow streets were lined with a never ending collection of bars, restaurants, tacky souvenir shops and even a couple of “ladies clubs”. Everywhere we looked signage, menus and even printed t-shirts were in English. There was absolutely no evidence of Greece. We could have been anywhere. It felt like a seaside town in England with guaranteed sunshine.
We have a term for this type of resort it’s “Brits Abroad” . Have you ever watched the film “Shirley Valentine” ? it’s a comedy/romance that came out in 1989 based upon a lady who escapes the confines of Liverpuddlian married life and takes herself off to Greece. Some of the reactions of the fellow guests in her hotel sum up for us a “Brits Abroad” mentality where fellow Brits travel to other countries and want it to be the same as at home.
This mentality still lives and breathes across Europe and the really sad part about it, other than the boards outside restaurants advertising English breakfast, is how the locals so desperate for the tourist pound change their lives and their culture to pamper to this demand.
Suddenly what was once a beautiful, quaint, town on the edge of the sea, founded 3500 years ago by the Minoans, grows into something that the older Greek generation cannot even recognise. All the authenticity is lost and you even find small Greek churches poking out from amidst this tourist chaos.
The narrow strip of sand that masquerades as a beach is absolutely heaving.
The harbour is no longer full of fishing boats returning from the morning catch but instead is overshadowed by two large imitation pirate ships loading their passengers for the “all day adventure” at sea. As they leave the harbour the drinks are already flowing, the buffet is being prepared for lunch that is a poor imitation of real greek food and the music will be playing. At some point they will drop anchor in a previously quiet bay with clear water just inviting them all to jump off and go for a dip. This whole scene is just so predictable and quite honestly as I’ve said before sad.
These people are not learning anything about the island, the Greek food or the people, they are just bringing their British culture to yet another seaside resort in the Mediterranean. This is no different to the time of the empire when as a country we happily took the British culture abroad and embedded it in countries such as India.
Our trip into town was short lived that day as we quickly made our way to the local large supermarket to pick up some supplies and then caught the bus back to solitude.
We had deliberately not chosen to hire a car on this trip as we were coming here to relax, unwind and catch our breath before going home to plan further travels. Without a car we found ourselves, at times, a little stranded.
We did manage to utilise the shuttle bus to our advantage and get off to walk through the village of Old Hersonissos with lime and pomegranate trees (see photograph above) lining the narrow road and even some grapes that we could easily have “borrowed”.
This is a small friendly village located less than two miles north of the “new” Hersonissos. It is located on the slope of Mount Charakas and from here we were also able to walk west to the villages of Piskopiano and Koutalafari where we ate at a couple of traditional family owned tavernas with more authentic Greek food.
We also took the shuttle bus down to a “sister resort” a bit further around the coast from Hersonissos at Stalis. Here we did partake in the touristic ritual of hiring a couple of sunbeds and an umbrella for the day and actually getting to spend some time on a beach. It was still pretty crowded but at least lunch wasn’t a “Brits Abroad” menu and the whole place was immaculately clean and very welcoming.
We also returned on another day and in need of some presents to take home wandered down through the shops and on out onto the coastline where we found an amazing quiet and peaceful cove to take a dip in the crystal clear blue sea and have an amazing lunch at another family owned taverna.
Our actual resort also had a list of coach trips available. Not normally our cup of tea but we thought we would give a half day tour a go and visited the island of Spinalonga which I will write about separately. Suffice to say the trip was good but being herded on and off a coach with set time frames to deliver to, isn’t us.
“Can you go on holiday when you are used to going travelling?
There is no doubt that we achieved our main aim of relaxing in the sun, recharging our batteries and refreshing our tired minds and bodies from everything 2024 has thus far chucked at us.
The view from our balcony was a welcome treat every morning when I stepped outside to have breakfast or watched the sun go down and the moon come up at night.
I also became used to the sound of the bells jangling as the local sheep and goats made their way down from higher pastures as the afternoon came to a close.
However we missed:
The solitude and the freedom of doing what we want when we want
The interaction with people. One of the loveliest parts of driving Route 66 was all the different people we met en route from locals to fellow road trippers.
The excitement of exploration. For example we will always remember driving down a winding coastal road into a small hamlet on the coast of Naxos with one taverna and a family eagerly waiting to greet us and share their culture and food at a leisurely pace.
Time standing still, being able to poodle along at our own pace, beholden to no one but ourselves
The laughter of our own shared company when the unexpected happens or things don’t go quite according to plan
For us this holiday has led to many discussions, reflections and foresights. Whilst we may well return to Crete, in the future, in order to explore it properly over a much longer period of time we have discovered that travelling provides greater stimulation and personal freedom to us than a holiday. This trip was unfortunately sorely lacking in these two areas. The answer, therefore, to the question posed at the start of this section is “No, you cannot go on holiday once you have been travelling!.
A Midlife Adventure 