Pandas in Naxos?!

Firstly let me explain Panda.  My husband is Paul and I am Amanda, hence the shortening to Panda!

Having had a lovely couple of days in Santorini it was then off to Naxos for a few weeks.  We had planned to come many years ago in the days of Exel Airlines, who went bust so we didn't make it but finally, here we are.  It is a lovely island and we both agree, one we would return to. We have been able to eat out every night on our meagre budget as the prices are very reasonable (for the most part). There are expensive tavernas obviously, but plenty that you can spend less than 25 euro for a meal for two with wine!
We have done lots of walking having caught the local buses up to the hill villages.  We have also tried to follow some printed walks....ha, ha. We gave up with the directions on our first walk from the village of Filoti to Halki and managed to battle our way through various overgrown paths and dry river beds to make it to our destination....eventually!!  The scenery was lovely with ancient churches (10th century) and spectacular views to the neighbouring islands and the taverna at the end was a very welcome sight!

10th century church

A welcome taverna!

Our second walk was slightly more successful with regard to following directions!  We headed to the village of Apeiranthos which was once known as 'the marble village' due to the huge amounts of marble to be found in the area.  There are still some beautiful buildings made with the local marble and tons of it just lying around!

As I said, we did manage to follow the directions for this walk but there was still a sting in the tail.  The walk stated it was an hour there and the same back, maybe if you have the stride of a giraffe or your name is Mo Farrah!!! After the first hour we still had a fair way to go so stopped for a few minutes for a tea break amongst the stunning scenery.

The hills of Apeiranthos

Having had our break we stomped onward to our goal of the church of Agia Kyriaki (9th century). Another 30 mins later we finally made it.  We then made the mistake of not reading the directions to the end as we were led to a path that came to an abrupt end whereby the directions instructed, now go back the way you came! By this time we were walking in the heat of the afternoon and I was beginning to resemble the colour of the rose wine I was looking forward to at the end! So, some 3.5 hrs later, we finally made it back to the village in time for a quick look around, a glass of wine and the bus back to Naxos town!

The marble houses of Apeiranthos