When I posted my last blog article I neglected to mention that we were in Patmos that afternoon after leaving Kusadasi. I also for lack of remembering names did not list any of the people on our Contiki tour:

 

Courtney, our Contiki tour manager from Australia (not pictured)
Adam & Alex, Brothers from South Africa
Sean, from London
Alyssa, from Toronto
Victoria from Calgary
Alicia from Terrace
Elysia and Lauren, cousins from Tasmania Australia
Lollie and Essy, friends from South Africa

 

 

 

Patmos was regrettably not as exciting as our previous islands so we decided to not do an excursion. Patmos held a religious importance to many in Greece. It is said that Patmos was where Saint John was sent into exile in a grotto. While he was there he wrote the Book of Revelation. At the highest point on the island is Saint John’s Monastery. We took a bus to the top of the mountain to see The Monastery then took a 40 minute hike down the mountain, past Saint John’s Grotto and back down to the Town.

Back on the boat we had a toga Karaoke party. Things got a little awkward when a guy ( who shall hence forth be referred to as our “+1″ ) sang a song dedicated to us Canadians, ” All by myself”  by Celine Dion. For some back reference, our +1 had been around since day one but his presence in the blog up until this point was unnecessary. +1 was really just a weird guy who tried to tag onto our Contiki group and eaves drop on any information our tour manager gave us. It was awkward because clearly all the members of our group didn’t appreciate him taking advantage of the tour insights we all paid for, never mind he always made sure to make every moment he spent with us awkward and uncomfortable. Not to mention he spoke in the most monotonous serial killer voice this side of Hannibal Lector!

Anyways, I guess he was feeling neglected and decided to send us some passive aggressive message about how abandoned he felt by us….which you know was weird because we did not know this person and he was not a part of our Contiki group. Everyone always tried to be nice but then he would ALWAYS make things awkward…

Despite the awkward moment, our toga party went on without skipping a beat. The group divided into two groups and we had a karaoke battle! The other group sang Blink 182s ” all the small things” and we killed it with “Bohemian Rhapsody”. Then the entire group sang the theme song for our trip, “Summer of 69”, which we all got the magical score of 69 on! Later Gavin got roped into a traditional Greek dance and I sat back and laughed.

The next day we woke up in Rhodes. Gavin and I decided to not do the Rhodes Acropolis excursion because we had seen quite a bit of ruins at this point and preferred to sleep past the 6am departure time. Rhodes is considered a world heritage site, it has classic Hellenic ruins, medieval castles and a mosque. This was the only island where we spent the entire day at the dock.

Gavin and I wandered the town and found ourselves at a medieval castle. We hadn’t seen any castles on our trip yet so we decided we would check it out. Since it was early tourist season in Rhodes. The entire castle was empty so Gavin and I ran around having photo shoots and enjoying the freedom of wandering an entire castle on our own.

After touring the castle we walked from the old city to the new city, went to the part of the island where people could jump into the water and swim and saw a lone diving board about 300 meters into the ocean.

Later we saw the place where the “Colossus of Rhodes” once stood. The colossus was a giant statue that stood at the opening of the Rhodes bay. It is no longer there but ancient texts around the world talk about how massive this statue once was.

Later that night on the boat we had a fancy meet and greet with the captain of the cruise. We had to dress very well, I unfortunately had nothing nice to wear and neither did Gavin. We took a photo with the captain (which cost €10 so we did not buy it). Afterwards we sat for dinner and were approached By the cruise director. She needed a couple to take part in a ” rock and roll couples contest” Gavin and I were the only couple in the group so we were voluntold to do this mysterious contest after dinner at 9pm.

It turns out it was a Grease (yes the movie not the country) themed contest. Gavin and I were forced to dress up with two other couples! I was put into a crepe paper poodle skirt with pigtails and rouge, Gavin wore an Afro wig with drawn on moustache and side burns and a soul patch. We had to do the choreography to the song, “You’re The One That I Want”, Some crazy jumping dance moves with the help of the staff and do a huge random dance number where we ran across the lounge. It was embarrassing and exhausting to say the least…We did not win but we won a shot glass and a crappy hat.