Ian & Lou's Website

In May/June of 2000 we went to Corfu for a couple of weeks. We stayed in a small village called Arillas in the North West of this beautiful island. We were about 5 minutes from the sea, in a recently re-furbished studio, surrounded by lemon and olive groves.

Corfu itself is a verdant island off the west coast of Greece in an areas of islands called the Ionians. It was on this island that Odysseus was supposed to have washed up during his 10 year wandering round the Mediterranean, following the seige of Troy. According to Homer, Odysseus was shipwrecked on the north of the island, found by Princess Nausicca and taken to meet her father King Alcanoos. Hemer's here was struck by the lush gardens of the king and Homer makes them sound like the garden of Eden. In the interveneing years many have been struck by the lush vegetatian which so esembled the land of the Phaecians described by Homer. Since then the island has been occupied by Romans, Venetians, French and British, all of whom have left their mark on the landscape, architecture and cuisine. The Venetians for example were responsible for introducing the ubiquitous olives trees, the Doge offerring to pay 12 gold pieces for eah 100 trees planted. The result was to turn the island into the biggest oilve grove in the world and, ironically for the garden of Alicanoos, the islanders eventually had to import food!

A lot of people around the world came to know the island and its inhabitants through the works of the Durrell family: "Prospero's Cell" and "My family and othre animals". In the UK, the islandbecame renowned during the TV show "Greece Uncovered" where young English people get drunk and have sex etc. Fortunately for us, this happens in Kavos in the far south of the island and we were at the other end!

Arillas is an unspoilt resort where locals still go fishing before retiring to one of the beach-side bars to watch the tourists attempt to get a tan in 2 weeks flat. The bits of the island that we managed to see are contrasting: from time mountain villages to huge (and ugly-looking) resorts like Sidari; cosmopolitan places like Corfu town (a.k.a. Kerkyra) to picturesque places like Arillas. The beach in Arillas itself is a couple of kilometres long and has exceptionally claer and fairly shallow waters. It is mostly sand, but has shingle in places, and is ideal for families with small children. There are "unofficial" nudist areas at each end and places where you can hire a pedaloe or go paragliding, but it is mostly a place to lie back and relax. We took an excursion to the mainland, to visit the port of Parga, which looks just like you imagine a Greek harbour town to be like. We also went to the islands of Paxos and Anti-Paxos. We went on a boat trip to the famous caves of Anti-Paxos and we (i.e. Ian) went for a swim in a lagoon with the clearest waters we've ever seen!

We looked at the small chapel up the (steep) hill in Arillas and also walked over the headline to the next resort of San Stefanos - which has a beach that's so long we gave up walking after a couple of kilometers! We had such a good holiday that we were planning to return within a week of getting there - and in fact we did (click button to the left to visit the 2001 pages). There is everything you could want from a relaxing holiday available in Arillas and even some oddities. For example the house next door was owned by some Jehovah's Witnesses (don't worry, they operated in the Greek stylee ie. The only way we discovered that they were Jehovah's Witnesses was because we noticed some faded leaflets in a box asking people to help themselves!). The most remarkeable thing about this house was the superbly lush plant life (wonder if this is one case of 'Miracle Grow' working?)

We met a loadof nice people, locals and Brits, who helped make the holiday a most bodacious experience. Special mentions must go to: Paul and Becc's for excellent company on the ferry and in the airport; Dimitri & Spiros for their enthusiastic support for the Greek footer team (despite the team not qualifying for Euro200); our rep Gill; and last, but not least, the owner of the Lambada bar, whose name I have most heinously forgotten, for his massive support for Liverpool FC (sadly the Lambada is now closed - though nobody appears to know why!)

Top tips we discovered/tried out:

1) don't bother with a travel iron - use a small spray bottle (available from Boots), sparay shirts etc with water & leave hanging and the creases just drop out!

2) before you go make up some cards with your flight details, contact numbers etc on. Get them laminated & place them in your suitcases and bags, so that if you get separated the airline can find you and return your stuff

3) put dry cleaning sheets (e.g. 'Bounce') into your luggage and your clothes will smell much fresher when you unpack (useful after a long wait at Gatwick/Corfu/wherever).

Click here for pictures of Arillas

Click here for pictures of other places we visited