Middle Aged Backpackers Returning to Gap Year Island Destination in Greece
When they reach a certain age, some people buy Porsches, some grow ponytails, some change the direction and focus of their lives, and some re-visit the places that they remember from their youth. The Greek island of Crete, a popular destination on the hippy trail in the sixties and the backpacking routes of the seventies, is seeing an increasing number of visitors returning for the first time since their college days.
Of course, many of the long haired travelers that slept on ferries with just a deck ticket and with a budget of a few Drachma a day, now work as accountants, lawyers, journalists, doctors, even diplomats. Yearning to return, often with teenagers of their own, to the places that they remember from their youth with the unique tastes and smells of the island still fresh in their memory, even after 25 or 30 years.
What then, can these travelers, expect? How has the island, the atmosphere, changed? Like Odysseus returning to Ithaca, will they recognize the place they left so many years before?
A recent visitor, now a well known journalist, was astonished to find high quality restaurants, suite type accommodation and a cafe bar culture in the town of Agios Nikolaos in Eastern Crete. His memories of the town in the 1970's were of streets packed with 18-30 tourists, bar crawls and cheap studio rooms. "Desperate youngsters would even pay to sleep on the roof of a hotel in those days, just to be part of the "Ag Nik" scene for a week", he said. " The difference in the place is almost unbelievable". Chic cafe bars have now replaced the cheap booze with skinny lattes and fredo capuccinos and the burger joints have given way to some of the finest cuisine in the eastern Mediterranean. One local restaurateur, Manolis Theodoros, described the fare as "traditional Cretan dishes with a contemporary twist, a mixture of mezes and nouvelle cuisine". The success of his operation, housed in a neo-classical building, proves that the visiting clientele have changed dramatically and are demanding far more than simple taverna food.
Of course, many of the long haired travelers that slept on ferries with just a deck ticket and with a budget of a few Drachma a day, now work as accountants, lawyers, journalists, doctors, even diplomats. Yearning to return, often with teenagers of their own, to the places that they remember from their youth with the unique tastes and smells of the island still fresh in their memory, even after 25 or 30 years.
What then, can these travelers, expect? How has the island, the atmosphere, changed? Like Odysseus returning to Ithaca, will they recognize the place they left so many years before?
A recent visitor, now a well known journalist, was astonished to find high quality restaurants, suite type accommodation and a cafe bar culture in the town of Agios Nikolaos in Eastern Crete. His memories of the town in the 1970's were of streets packed with 18-30 tourists, bar crawls and cheap studio rooms. "Desperate youngsters would even pay to sleep on the roof of a hotel in those days, just to be part of the "Ag Nik" scene for a week", he said. " The difference in the place is almost unbelievable". Chic cafe bars have now replaced the cheap booze with skinny lattes and fredo capuccinos and the burger joints have given way to some of the finest cuisine in the eastern Mediterranean. One local restaurateur, Manolis Theodoros, described the fare as "traditional Cretan dishes with a contemporary twist, a mixture of mezes and nouvelle cuisine". The success of his operation, housed in a neo-classical building, proves that the visiting clientele have changed dramatically and are demanding far more than simple taverna food.
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