Children of Apollo

alinak15 (61)in #mykonos • 7 years ago (edited)

Hello my beautiful Steem people😀!!!

Mykonos, what can I say about this island that has not been said before?

Well you know me, definitely a thing or two!!😂😂

Let's put some music on first 😉!

It is surely the Queen of the Aegean Sea or even better, the love child of the whole Mediterranean!

Famous for numerous things and reasons and If I had to come up with one right now, straight from the top of my head, I would say the unique combination of the two things I will describe below!

In one hand you have this extreme and vivid social life starring Celebrities, Movie Stars, Fashion Icons and Designers! Tycoons, Princesses and Princes, Kings and Queens, definitely Football stars (the first day I arrived I saw Francesco Totti, all dressed in black and looking like a dapper!!) and anything else you can imagine, going hand in hand with this lot, while on the other hand....

You have simplicity at its best!!!

My first days here I was staying at this lovely, cosy and traditional family hotel, where the owner Mrs. Maria an 85 year old lady, made me feel like home!

She also made THE MOST AMAZING Spanakopita I have ever had!! I took some photos so you can have a look !

She said that this is the favourite dish of Brad Pitt!! When I asked her how she knew, she just winked at me and said she will tell me another time!!!

I really can't say enough good things about Mrs. Maria and all the local people I met!!!

This was the first time I came purely for holiday and I have promised to Mrs. Maria since I didn't stay my whole holiday time at her place that I will be visiting her back in the winter!!!

You see I met an old friend of mine - I used to work as a model for him, he owns one of the most luxurious, exclusive clothing lines in the world - at Chora one morning and he wouldn't take no for an answer, so I moved at his villa. Which was convenient after all, since I had friends arriving and his place was ideal!

One morning I even went with Mrs. Maria and picked up eggs from the nestle, exactly outside the hotel as you see in the photo below. I always loved to do that as a child with my grandma!!!Mrs. Maria informed me the first night we had dinner together, that the house across the field, was the summer villa of the most distinguished plastic surgeon in Greece!

"Now that is an upturn" I said "and I had just convinced myself that this spot is more down to earth compared to the rest of the island" and I smiled.

The next morning, I met with the doctor and first thing he told me was that he remembered me from the plane two nights prior to that day. Apparently we came in the same flight from Athens to Mykonos. He had a long flight from Rio de Janeiro (for an annual plastic surgeons' meeting) to Paris, then a connecting flight to Athens and finally Mykonos.

Then I helped him pick his cucumbers, tomatoes and aubergines and later on, he cooked for me.

During this very delicious lunch, a really intriguing discussion occured since I discovered a few things.

First, the doctor and I (I prefer not to name him since he is renowned and I wouldn't want to cause him any unpleasantness) both love Schubert and our favourite piece is Serenade!

Another thing I found out, is about the old mines of Mykonos, at the North East side of the island. Mind you I have been here more or less a dozen times (for work every single time combined with holiday sometimes) but never knew! I will be back to this shortly!

Basic information about the island

Mykonos is a Greek island, part of the Cyclades, lying between Tinos, Syros, Paros and Naxos.
It has a population of nearly 12,500, most of whom live in the main town of Chora. Mykonos has a typical Mediterranean climate. The sun shines for up to 300 days a year. The island produces 4,500 cubic metres (160,000 cu ft) of water daily, by reverse osmosis of sea water in order to help meet the needs of its population and visitors.
Although temperatures can rise as high as 40 °C (104 °F) in the summer months, average high temperature is around 28 °C (82 °F) and because of the seasonal cool "meltemia" wind, summer days are dry, sunny and pleasant. In the winter, average high temperature is around 15 °C (59 °F). The winters in general are mild and wet, with many sunny days still even in mid-winter. Snow is infrequent and doesn't stay long on the ground when it falls.

Mykonos's nickname is "The Island of the Winds" and for a good reason!!!

Surfers' Paradise!!!!

I have flown here without the need of a parachute LOL!!! The wind picked me up while coming out from a restaurant and landed me on a car at the other side of the alley, by a miracle I didn't get hurt!!!

Mythology says that….

Mykonos was named after its first ruler, Mykonos (Μύκονος), the son or grandson of the god Apollo and a local hero.

Time for our usual History Lesson

Herodotus mentions Carians as the original inhabitants of the island. Ionians from Athens seem to have followed next in the early 11th century BC. There were many people living on the neighbouring island of Delos, just 2 km (1.2 miles) away, which meant that Mykonos became an important place for supplies and transit.

Mykonos came under the control of the Romans during the reign of the Roman Empire and then became part of the Byzantine Empire until the 12th century.

And some beautiful traditional island music!

In 1204, with the fall of Constantinople in the Fourth Crusade, Mykonos was occupied by Andrea Ghisi, a relative of the Doge of Venice. The island was ravaged by the Catalans at the end of the 13th century and finally given over to direct Venetian rule in 1390.
In 1537, while the Venetians still reigned, Mykonos was attacked by Hayreddin Barbarossa, the admiral of Suleiman the Magnificent, and an Ottoman fleet established itself on the island. The Ottomans, under the leadership of Kapudan Pasha, imposed a system of self-governance comprising a governor and an appointed council of syndics. When the castle of Tinos fell to the Ottomans in 1718, the last of the Venetians withdrew from the region.

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Up until the end of the 18th century, Mykonos prospered as a trading centre, attracting many immigrants from nearby islands, in addition to regular pirate raids. In June 1794 the Battle of Mykonos was fought between British and French ships in the island's main harbour. The Greek Revolution against the Ottoman Empire broke out in 1821 and Mykonos played an important role, led by the national heroine, Manto Mavrogenous.

Mavrogenous, a well-educated aristocrat guided by the ideas of the Enlightenment, sacrificed her family's fortune for the Greek cause.

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Greece became an independent state in 1830. A statue of her sits in the middle of Mando Mavrogenous square in the main town.

As a result of sailing and merchant activity, the island's economy quickly picked up but declined again during the late 19th century and especially after the opening of the Corinth Canal in 1904 and the First World War at the beginning of the 20th century. Many Mykonians left the island to find work in mainland Greece and many foreign countries, especially the United States.

Here you can see my posts about the opening of the Corinth Canal :

Part I

Part II

Both a beautiful read 😘!!

FAIRIES OF MYKONOS

Next day Mrs. Maria had a visit from a friend of hers, Mr. Andrea. The three of us had dinner together and so Mr. Andreas, the kind and always with a smile on his face man, told me a story I had never heard before but somehow, it did ring a bell!

So the story was this: "During the Turkish occupation, the Aegean islands were suffering from the buccaneers attacks. The buccaneers were pirates, who were acting with the Ottoman Empire's support.
The most formidable buccaneer of the Mediterranean was Barbarossa.

The inhabitants of Mykonos, like the inhabitants of all the other Aegean islands, were trying to defend themselves and survive in every way possible. The Mykonians however, were particularly intelligent and inventive.

As Mr. Andreas said, the Mykonians were the ones who created a myth about fairies and elves. At this point, you can imagine my excitement to see how the story continued. And so he did..

Mr Andreas - "The wisest of the island's created a story, according to which, girls of indescribable beauty, with lean bodies, long luxurious hair and bright eyes, were strolling along the waters. By waters, I mean the sea, streams, rivers and springs", said Mr. Andreas pompously.

"Their beauty was such, that men were under their spell, which unable to resist, were running behind them as if hypnotized. Then, all of a sudden, the elves would appear and kill the men. For the fairies never went out unaccompanied, but always under the watchful eye of the elves.

This myth soon became known throughout the lengths and widths of the Aegean Sea, resulting in the buccaneers attacks diminishing considerably for many years to come".

This was the myth of the Fairies of Mykonos!

Ding Dong...

Work I did in Mykonos, back in my modeling days that was based on that myth!!!

The set on the photo shooting above, is the villa in the movie below starring Kevin Sorbo.

The old Mines.....

So when the doctor told me about the old mines, I did my research and of course visited the place ....with my friend Natalia that joined me some days later!

The now abandoned area, is composed mostly of Granite and the terrain is very rocky with many areas that have eroded due to the strong winds. High quality Clay and Baryte, which is a mineral used as a lubricant in oil drilling, were mined on the eastern side of Mykonos until the late 1900s.

This side of the island is now completely deserted, at one time however, it had 'seen' great glories. As you see in the photo below!

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When we arrived there, the place was reminiscent of a desolate landscape. The sky was an iridescent blue, like in the rest of the island, for the duration of our time there.

The sea however, contrary to the waters elsewhere in the island, was eerily calm, in absolute harmony with the landscape. Another surprise was that, the second I stepped foot on that beach, a beach with teeny tiny pebbles, I found a 5 euro note. In the most deserted (possibly) beach of the Mediterranean, I found a banknote. There it is in the photo below!!

Followed by the arrival of a man surfacing from the water, dressed in SAS gear! You can imagine how startled we were, especially my friend Natalia, (she took the photo you can see below) and Ι.

She was the first to glance at the man coming out of the water, like the next James Bond!! 😉

And he was extremely friendly!

Truth be told, it was an unforgettably wonderful experience. Never could I have imagined that, of all the corners of the earth, I would have witnessed this in cosmopolitan Mykonos!

The Island of the Churches!!!

The reason for the abundance of churches is that for a number of years to build a house, the islanders were required to build a church on their land first.

1. Panagia Paraportiani - (the Church of Our Lady) one of the most famous architectural structures in Greece. The church received its name Paraportiani, which means "standing next to the entrance / door", because it was located next to the entrance of the ancient castle, or kastro door.

The neighbourhood of Kastro, where it is situated, used to be the site of a medieval castle – in those days a castle was a strong fortification surrounding a settlement – constructed in 1207 by the Ghisi family, who controlled the island at the time. The castle was destroyed in the 16th century and its remnants covered up by new buildings when Chora began to expand in the 18th century. It took around 200 years to build the church. Construction began in the 15th century and was not completed until the 17th century. Its architectural quirkiness makes it one of the most photographed places in the world.

2. Catholic Church - the only Catholic church on the island was constructed in 1668 and renovated in 1677 by Bishop Leandros Zanthakis. The icon of the Virgin Maryand baby Jesus between Saint Dominic and Saint Catherine of Siena was transported to Mykonos from Venice in 1715. A fire on 1 May 1991 damaged part of the church. By October 1997 the church was restored and re-opened to the public.

3. Mykonos windmills - The windmills are a defining feature of the Mykonian landscape. There are many dotted around the island, but most are concentrated in the main town of Chora. The famous "Kato Mili" in Chora (Greek for lower mills), stand in a row on a hill overlooking the sea to harness the strong northern winds.Capped with wood and straw, the windmills were built by the Venetians in the 16th century to mill flour and remained in use until the early 20th century. Many have been refurbished and restored to serve as homes to locals and vaults to numerous Mykonian heritage documents.

4. Little Venice - rows of fishing houses line the waterfront with their balconies hanging over the sea. The first of these was constructed in the mid-18th century. They originally belonged to rich merchants or captains and the little basement doors that provided direct access to the sea and underground storage areas led people to believe that the owners were secretly pirates. Some of the houses have now been converted into bars and cafes and little shops and galleries.

Going back in time!

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Little Venice is considered one of the most romantic spots on the island and many people gather there to watch the sunset. The area attracts many artists who come to paint the picturesque coastline.

Tourism soon came to dominate the local economy, owing a lot to the important excavations carried out by the French School of Archaeology, which began work in Delos in 1873.

I have so much to say about this place, experiences, photos....

Also Delos, the island of Apollo but I think it will be for another post in the future....maybe just a couple of photos for now!

I extend my utmost praise to the inhabitants' genius, who, as worthy followers of their ancestors, continue to this day and in the best possible way, to promote their island in the world market of tourism. An island, which doesn't really differ from its neighbours, but its inhabitants stand tall, above all the others'. Hospitable people, who love beauty and life!!

Mykonos has been the set for many movies; by far my favourite is the following!