In these dark, dog days of January, it is hard to raise the spirits. My retirement counter says 544 days to go. And yet we will be flying off to Greece in just less than 11 weeks. We are already thinking about booking Hotels in Athens either end of our Easter trip. We fly Olympic on the Saturday night but there is no ferry on Sunday. (See ferry timetable) We have to stay in Athens and get the boat on Monday. We stay at The Electra Hotel in Athens. it is a delightful, 4* Hotel on Ermou Street in the centre.
We have been staying there for quite a few years now. I first read about it in a book written by Austin Kark who was the Head of the BBC’s World Service.
He was married to Nina Bawden the children’s fiction writer. He had been stationed in Greece in the early ’60s and, when they were both rich and famous, they had decided to buy an old property in the ancient coastal capital of Nafplion and to renovate it. Each time they flew out to Greece to check on progress, they had to stay in Athens and they chose the Electra Hotel. Kark’s book started me on the ambition to buld a house in Greece and to stay at the Electra Hotel.
Just as a sad post script to that tale, Austin Kark was killed in the Potters Bar rail crash in July 2006. His wife, Nina Bawden who is in herself 83, was knocked unconscious and broke her pelvis. She has campaigned for victims of the accident ever since.
January 20th, 2009
Dear old Mr Pericles Panagopoulos, owner of Blue Star Ferries & Superfast, has been released by his kidnappers but for the reported ransom of 40 million euros which, at today’s exchange rate is £37,000,000.00. Just a snip!
January 21st, 2009
Just heard this afternoon – Ofsted in on Monday. Can life get any better? Oh to be in Hellas.