A bit of a detour en route to Montpellier!

By the time we set off on October 2nd there was a sense of "end of season" although the days were beautifully sunny. Friends were peeling off, but John W was back and kindly helped us transport the sunbeds from "our tree" to their winter resting place! This gave us a day without so we made a fairly chaotically arranged trip out to Houmas, where we arrived in time for lunch and then took a brief dip in the sea, and dropped in at the cantina which was deserted! That evening we hosted dinner at the Seagull,and stayed late at Cosmogonia.

The onward journey started with the 3.30 bus to Chania, We fought and won a battle with the left luggage system, and wandered down to see a few sights and have a light meal at The Red Bicycle, where the main waiter always recognises us and asks about Paleo. The airport bus we had chosen was probably one too late as it was a tight schedule to get checked-in and onto a totally full flight to Thessaloniki.

Why there? A - we have heard it is a beautiful and interesting city, and B- we needed a Ryanair hub, so that we could fly eventually into Girona airport to reclaim Yvette without tangling with Barcelona, and this was the obvious choice! It gave us a day and a half for sightseeing.

We stayed the two nights at an airport hotel:- in part as we landed around 11pm. Plans to use busses to get into the city next morning were abandoned when we saw the location, so we took a taxi and were dropped somewhere near where we had in mind. Fellow-blogger Mick - a real Thessaloniki enthusiast - had furnished us with a list of things to see and restaurants. We melded this with a suggested walking tour, which would cover the most famous sites.
Once we had established where we were we set off towards the sea and were soon admiring the spacious squares and elegant buildings bout which we had heard so much. We were also impressed by the cycle paths, but less so by the rented scooters! At the old port Bob took a look at the museums, and then we tried to find the area known as Ladadika , described by one person as a "lovely place for great restaurants" and another as "overpriced tourist trap"! Greyrocks' opinion will have to wait as we never got to its heart or even its periphery, being under-prepared! Instead we ended up on the busiest commercial street gasping for a drink one could consume without sitting on a bar stool! We felt like country bumpkins dodging traffic, holding on tight to bags and clutching our pathetic little map! We were less impressed by this bit of the city!

We then negotiated road works and renovations to historic buildings to find Agia Sofia cathedral. we thought were insufficiently modestly attired, but nobody was policing this, so we had a brief look inside! Impressive - even to atheists!
Now the weather started to deteriorate. We walked to the Arch of Galerius and Rotunda, and then decided we needed a rest and, after a hunt for the right place, found ourselves in the University area, and in a bar where we were the oldest clients by about fifty years! This didn't seem to matter, and as the rain started we moved inside and stayed a long time. This left the White Tower on the list of "must see", and us cold and tired of walking! Unsurprisingly a cab driver refused to take us there, so we did struggle there, and were pleased we did!

We remembered Rick Stein saying he had a long-standing arrangement to meet old friends at the tower many years after a first visit. It is, indeed, very striking. After circumnavigating it and reading plenty about its history we decided not to seek out the recommended restaurants this time round, but eat early in one the many places nearby, and then take a cab straight back to the hotel. More or less at random we chose a simple place with no English menus on display, and thus had a delicious meal with friendly service. It might make it to Trip Advisor! Afterwards we stepped straight into a taxi with a helpful driver, and felt we had done our best, given the weather and our advanced age! After all we would definitely be back!

In the morning it was pouring with rain, so we decided not to spend the morning in the city, but kill time till check-out and then at the airport. The latter we thought would be bound to have decent facilities for catering and resting! How wrong we were! It is - currently - a shambolic overcrowded hell-hole! Unable to drop our luggage for hours and go through to the more civilised airside part we lurked in Arrivals with a can of beer, surrounded by riotous German children. Eventually we did find something to eat and some wine, then onto the full flight to Girona, featuring all the comfort for which Ryanair is famed! And that was the conclusion of our truncated Greek summer!