Greek Island Hopping, Part 4 : Mastihari, Kos

We spent our last three nights in Mastihari where we'd stayed last July (HERE). Although there's several large AI hotels on the outskirts of the village (be prepared for a 50 minute walk if you're tempted to book), Mastihari itself has no package tourism with the villagers owning all the holiday rentals, ensuring that the money made from tourism is reinvested into the village.  

When I'd looked for somewhere to stay in Mastihari, everything had been fully booked but, a couple of days before we flew to Kos, Andreas Studios popped up on Booking.com. A five minute walk from the harbour, we'd checked in, unpacked and were tucking into a Greek salad in a beachfront taverna less than half an hour after getting off the ferry.

Mastihari has a long sandy beach but, when it's windy, the seaweed can be a problem. It doesn't smell but it sticks to you and even after using the beach showers after a swim, you're peeling it off for hours afterwards. 

When we'd arrived at the harbour to board our ferry to Leros (which, as you may remember, ended up cancelled due to dangerously high winds leading to an emergency dash across the island to catch a catamaran), the council tractors were clearing the seaweed up but a week later it was back with avegeance. It takes more than seaweed to put me off swimming but I know a lot of people detest it. 

Sunbeds were free to taverna customers and, with the tourist season nearing its end, we weren't squashed together like sardines although we did have to share with a very fussy cat! 

The sunsets in Mastihari are glorious.

We loved sitting on our bougainvillea-covered balcony watching the rosy-fingered dusk take a grip of the sky before heading to the beach to watch the sun drop into the Aegean.

 

Jon travelled with four shirts and two pairs of shorts and I packed three sundresses and travelled in a kaftan. Everything was worn over and over and over again.

Yammas!

I keep meaning to show this photo to Antony, manager of the Sue Ryder charity shop, I found my £2 dress on their sale rail the week before we left.

Although our apartment had a kitchenette we'd got out of the habit of making breakfast, like we usually do, and walked around the corner every morning for a freshly baked bougatsa (custard pie) or spanakopta (spinach pie) from the village bakery. 

Lunch was eaten at the beachfront taverna, the Kos salads - with goat's cheese, bagel chips, cashew nuts, tomatoes, mixed leaves and pesto - were amazing! 

Mastihari by night....

I've no idea what we were doing, I blame Horizon and their cocktails.

You won't be surprised to learn that we met lots of lovely cats.

The village held a tourism festival laying on traditional music, dancing and free food and drink to thank everyone for supporting Mastihari.

It was very windy that night so we left them to it and headed for a sheltered taverna.

And after a totally chilled three nights - and one last sunset - it was time to catch the bus to the airport. We were hoping Tui would bump us off the flight like they tried to do on our flight out but sadly, it was not meant to be and we arrived back in Birmingham in the early hours of Monday 29th September.

It was lovely to be reunited with the boys again (and look how close they are!) 

And to discover a hedgehog had moved into William's catio.

We truly loved every minute of our two week island-hopping odyssey, yes, even that catarmaran ride! If you're toying with the idea, do it. I'd revisit all of those islands in a heartbeat but Greece has 6,000 islands and we've only visited 20 of them (and three places on the mainland)....it's a big old world!

See you soon!