I'm back from Greece!!! With **59** pics!!!

[Miss Z]

Hello again Pet Talk!

I've had a spectacular holiday in Halkidiki in Eastern Greece, we stayed in a fabulous hotel well worth its five stars and we went on some really great trips out too. Of course, as requested, I've had my camera out quite a bit so I hope you all like these pics, there are 59 in total so it's going to take me a while to post them all but I really hope you enjoy them! So, without further ado, picture number 1:

Starting with the hotel, this was the view of the pool from our room


My dad and my brother playing volleyball in the pool


The hotel was beachfront, so here is the beach


And another


The view across the bay from the main balcony


My brother and I getting ready for a 'doughnut' ride. I don't know why our expressions look so moody, LOL


Starting the doughnut ride


Lots more to come.....

[Miss Z]

Whilst my brother and I were swimming in the sea, we came across a little fish that was swimming quite slowly near the surface. My brother caught it in his bare hands and put it in a bucket where we had a look at it. We saw that it had been attacked by something, its tail and left fin were missing. We felt sorry for the fish, and set it free in a small inlet amongst the rocks where it would be safe-ish from another attack. We called the little guy 'Victor' as he had a victory over the predator




I decided to do something a bit different this holiday, so I went on a parachute ride! This is the bay where it began


Then I had to get strapped in (yes I am there, behind the big white thing )


Going up...


Higher and higher...


That little speck is me!


Coming back down again


Plenty more on their way...

[Miss Z]

Finally getting my feet back on a hard surface. It is such an amazing experience, I would recommend it to anyone. It's not scary in the slightest, you just get the great feeling of floating in the air and taking in the lovely scenery



One morning, we got up quite early, and got the chance to see this beautiful Greek sunrise from our room


Sorry this didn't come out to well, but this is a 'Greek night', with traditional Greek dancing and food


OK, that's all the hotel pics, now for some more interesting ones
This was the local town, Kalithea, which was very quaint


We went on a trip to Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city. This is the view from across the harbour


This is the 'White Tower', a main point of Thessaloniki. However, nowadays it isn't all that white!




Lots more coming!

[Miss Z]

My brother



A park in central Thessaloniki


Ancient ruins down a main street in Thessaloniki


My brother and I in a restaurant


The view of Thessaloniki from the Acropolis, the highest point of the city


Wine caskets from ancient times in the Thessaloniki museum


Ancient statue and pillars


Absolutely loads more....

[Miss Z]

The museum was filled with much ancient handicraft, this was probably made for a rich Greek citizen well over 2000 years ago



A stone depiction of a family


Another statue


We also went on a boat trip around the three peninsulas of Halkidiki, mainly to see the third peninsula which is home to Mount Athos. This is a view of the bay we set off from


Cruising away from the shore


My brother on the boat


My mum and my brother on the top deck, with my brother's weird expression


More are on their way...

[Miss Z]

Mount Athos itself, with a beautiful river valley running down it



A monastery on Mount Athos. Monks have inhabited this peninsula for hundreds of years, and they still live here in complete isolation from the rest of the world


The town of Ouranopolis, where we stopped for a rest


Another trip we went on was to a waterpark, nothing too exciting about this but thought I'd include it anyway
My mum in the pool


My brother just landing in the water


My dad coming down the slide


The larger slides, my brother went on the white ones many times and came down like a bullet! He has no fear.

[Miss Z]

This is the entrnce to the tombs of ancient Macedonian kings, the most famous of which is Philip II. Cameras were not allowed inside the tombs, so unfortunately I don't have any pictures of that to show you, however, it was very interesting and the museum also below has plenty of information about the times of Alexander the Great.



We also visited a greek winery, this is the cellar where the wine matures


And these are the huge wine storage tanks where the wine is kept before bottling


The winery was filled with cats to keep the mouse and rat population down, this little beauty posed nicely for the camera


And it turned out, she had a kitten. This little guy was so cute, I watched him chasing and catching an imaginary mouse for about 5 minutes instead of listening to the information the guide was giving us


The final trip we went on was to the waterfalls of Edessa, the highest waterfalls in Greece.


The view over the hills from the top of the waterfall


Still a few more to come...

[Miss Z]

Another view



Closer to the waterfall, you could feel the spray from at least 50m away and 10m up from where the plungepool was


Behind the waterfall


This was supposed to be another landscape picture, but my brother decided to stick his head into it just as I pressed the button


My brother getting soaked at the bottom of the waterfall


The top of the waterfall


Another slightly smaller waterfall


Last few pics in next post

[Miss Z]

A beautiful 'water garden' view from the small restaurant at Edessa. That calm water doesn't look as if it's about to plunge down the waterfall!



My brother in the restaurant (sorry to have so many pics of my brother )


Some of the wonderfully shaped-rocks carved by the waterfall


And last but not least... yep, that's a cat. He sat in there just by the payment office!


That's it! I hope you enjoyed them. I would reccommend Halkidiki as a very relaxing and a pleasant place to spend a fortnight.

[Alysser]

Beautiful pictures, Zara! It looks like a wonderful vacation. I love the hotel and all the scenery, it's marvelous, every single picture was enjoyed here. I love the parachuting. But I thought you land in the water? I'm always offered to let me do it on trips but I chicken out. Anyway, sorry for blabbing, all the pics were wonderful!

[Killearn Kitties]

Such a photogenic country! I also like it because there is always plenty of opporunity to photograph cats.

I'm glad you had such a good time.

[elizabethann]

Those are great photos!

[Vela]

Thanks for sharing, looks like you guys had a great holiday. I'd love to visit there someday.

[Barbara]

What a wonderful trip- nature, culture and Greek kittys I'd like to go right now

[lv4dogs]

What wonderful pics and a very informative tour guide (you). Thanks for sharing your experience & a bit of history. You sure are lucky to be able to experience such things.