Agiasos

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Its an incredible place

What Agiasos is famous of is the folk art, the St Mairy church, the beauty of the village and the humour of the people.  It is a very traditional and picturesque place and a very culturally important place for Lesvos.  This village is not to far from the town Mytilini its about 30min so you can easily squeeze it in on an afternoon or morning.  See here for more http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agiasos

Plomari Area

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Plomari and the around area is the famous place from where the the ouzo comes!  When it comes to Ouzo we take thing seriously in Levos as you would imagine.

One of the most prestigious brand in Lesvos is Barbayanis: http://www.barbayanni-ouzo.com/.  It would be a great idea to go and see the distillery as it is one of the oldest and more famous, if you go there you will learn the neaty greaty of ouzo, highly recommended. http://www.barbayanni-ouzo.com/ouzo-museum-lesvos.html

Here is a nice Ouzo guide: http://www.lesvos.com/ouzo.html

My personal Favorite is Pitsalidi

When I am abroad I will ask for Ouzo Plomari

However dont constraint yourselves and try, ask what people think. Me and my father have different tastes and argue a lot about which ouzo is best.

Okay so enough with drinking lets stay somber.

Make sure you stop to the Plomari Village (for the ouzo) and walk around as it is very beautiful with many big trees and picturesque roads.

Then some nice beaches that you should have in mind are:

• Melinta

• Drota

• Agios Isidoros

Vatera

Then near the plomari area is Vatera which is the longest beach on the island. It is a great family vacation style place. If you want to have room on the beach, you can defiantly find it :)  Tip: At the end of the beach up on the heel (Agios Fokas) there is an amazing fish taverna, keep an eye for it.

Kalloni

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Welcome to the town of Sardines!

We have a unique kind of sardines and the sepciallity is salted sardines. See bellow how they look and how they eat them. I give respect to this fella he is doing a very good job!

These type of Sardines are small and sweet and is a great "mezes" (tapas) for your ouzo. Make sure you buy some when you are there. These Sardines only grow to the Kalloni bay and that's why is a big deal.  In addition to your stop to "Skala Kallonis" to eat the sardins a good stop would be the village called "Parakoila" there is a very nice square in the village and is great for a short stop to have a greek cofee.

Crete

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So if what you have read up until now does not thrill you, or if you have a long time to explore then you should consider Crete

I cannot say many things about Crete here, because I will need to say many many things.

Crete, is another Greece inside Greece it has its own very distinctive culture and type of people. You could thing of Crete as the Sicily or Bask country of Greece, with its own very pride people and it own unique heritage.  Crete is the second largest island in Greece (Mytilini is the third) and it is 100% worth your time. It has evrything from sunny beaches, to beutiful mountains and it own amazing uniques. Crter itself changes significantly between its 3 main parts and is wanderfull to explore the differecne within the island.

In addition they have a unique musique like the one you can listen here which is called "Mantinada"

In Crete there was a very advanced ancient civilaziation called Minoan before the Ancient Athens and after during the end of the Egyptian civilization you can see more information here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minoan_civilization

There are things to see in Crete for everyone independent of what type of vacations you want. It is a very touristic island and you will be able to find the holiday comfort if you want it.  Another good thing about Crete is that there are many regular ferries as well as fast ferries. The normal ferry will take you from Piraeus to 10 to 12 hours and the fast one between 4 and 6 hours depending the port you are going.

You can book tickets from here: http://paleologos.forth-crs.gr/english/npgres.exe?PM=BB  (I know that it looks dodgy but they still have teh same layout since the 90s - dont worry!)  Also there are several Airports that you can use, so look into flights to save time.

The one thing to keep in mind is that exploring Crete needs time 1 week minimum, if you do not have this time you will be better of visiting on of the smaller islands.

The road to Turkey

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As you will know the Lesvos island is very close to Turkey and there are daily feries to Ayvalik like the one bellow and costs 15 to 20 Euros and takes 1:30 hour.

From Ayvalik it takes 5 to 6 hours to go to Istanbul.  See these links for more information: http://www.lesvos.co.uk/turkey.htm and http://www.magicaljourneys.com/Lesvos/lesvos-travel-turkey.html.  Also there are day trips arranged to Turkey which is a very fun activity to do and you do not really need to plan for that you can arrange it once you are here from the various travel agencies.  If you want to plan it then call these guys to arrange what you need http://www.lesvos.co.uk/turkey.htm