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The Island of Zakynthos

IIn July 2004 we spent a week on the lovely Greek Island of Zakynthos. Our base was in the small village of Kalamaki which is in the South of the Island.

We were lucky enough to be in the Greek Islands when the later stages of Euro 2004 were talking place and manged to see the two final games in Zakynthos. The staff at our local taverna stopped serving as the game grew to a close and exploded withjoy at the final whistle.
Shortly after the match had finished the streets were full of cars covered in the Greek flags and honking thier horns.

We decided to hire a car and tour the island, we started out at Kalamaki and headed through the mountains passing through the villages of Lithakia and Agios Nicholaos.
At the village of Exo Hora we stopped off for a coffee and stretch our legs with a walk around the streets.
The village is a throw back in time with older buldings and old greek men sitting around drinking coffee and shooting the breeze.

We then headed further West, dropping steeply towards Vromi Bay, the views from the coast road are dramatic, apparently the Greeks used this bay to hide there Submarines in Word war 2.

Further up the coast is viewing platform that over looks Navagio bay which is better known as shipwreck cove, where the wreck of MV Panaciotis, a ship thought to be involved in smuggling is embedded in the sand.

We decided to stop at the village of Volimes and have lunch at Kaminaki taverna, the owner was a friendly guy who was in the process of building a new house right across the road from his taverna, between acting as our waiter he kept running across the road with building plans and climbing the scaffolding to keep an eye on his builders.

From Volimes we cut across country and drove down the steep, curving road with dramatic views of Alikes bay, we then turned inland and drove through the lush valley of Zakynthos which is the heart of the grape growing area and finally back to Kalamaki.

More of our Zante Pages | Euro 2004 | South Coast | East Coast | A boat trip around the Island