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We are surrounded with icons… every pop star, actor, reality TV king and queen and athlete.

While every building or feat in history is iconic.

Orthodox Christians though are not so loose in their use of the word.

For them an icon is a revered, holy picture or symbol central to their Christianity.

I first saw Orthodox Christians at prayer, and in full flow, from the Jordan banks as they were submerged into the River Jordan.

They were a mere 50 feet away in Israel at the sight of where the Israelis believe John the Baptist baptised Christ.

The Jordanians believe it was further inland in their country. Petra and the sands of time.

Of course in Greece where I spent the last few days (you might have noticed), as in everywhere in Southern Europe, churches proliferate.

And on those Greek islands often they have a very distinctive azure blue dome.

To act as a beacon for fishermen.

The Greek Orthodox churches are every bit as beautiful as the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches.

But with some differences, the icons being one.

The Greek Orthodox Church which has 25 million followers,. Half of whom live in Greece.

It differs from the Roman Catholic Church by not having the Pope as their head of the church.

The most (no, I’m not giving you that word) important church in the Orthodox world is the Hagia Sofia in Constantinople.

They insist on referring to it by its old name before it became Istanbul.

It is of course now the Aya Sofya mosque www.ayasofyamuzesi.gov.tr a much venerated centre of the Islamic faith.

And here’s me worshipping the Divine One… I can’t imagine He really cares who, or how, we pay homage Wham bam, thank you Hamam.

Come to think of it that carpet looks very like the one in my home growing up..

My Dear Old Dad loved that carpet and woe betide you if you spilled a drink on it… blood was very nearly spilt.

Instead of a Pope the Greek Orthodox Church is run by a synod of bishops.

Apart from that they seem to pretty much be run along the same lines.

Their altar looks different with the icons, particularly John the Baptist and Our Lady figuring prominently.

And they have a room at the back belonging to the priest which apparently it is frowned upon for lay people to enter.

They tell me now.

Of course another thing they are instantly recognisable for is their monks with their long white beards, always a good look.

Like Archbishop Mikarios or the monk in my lift at the Athens InterContinental www.intercontinental.com who was getting a little impatient with the buttons.

They, of course, will be the iconic Greek Orthodox monks.

Visit www.kythera.gr/en/

I flew Lufthansa Dublin through Munich to Athens which cuts down on costs. www.lufthansa.com.

And Athens to Kythera, just an hour’s flight with Aegean www.aegeanair.com.

Panos had it covered.

There are demonstrations in downtown Athens. Meh. More demonstrations?

‘The Acropolis? I know a route. Fifteen minutes. €10.’

Which was the price the concierge at the Athens InterContinental quoted me.

Panos is in serious danger of giving cabbies a good name.

And after I’d drawn breath and it was time to head back to the hotel, Nic was ready to let his cafe au lait go cold.

And when I asked him the fare… ‘Whatever you think.’

A word or twelve on the Acropolis. Well, there have been 2,000 and more years and millions of bettet scribes than me.

These are my pictures. And when I thought that the Fates had prevented me getting them it just made me elated when I did.

Make your own pictures and memories.

But never be afraid to ask…

www.aia.gr,www.atthenaeum.intercontinental.com/en/ www.athensattica.com/things-to-see/museums/acropolis-museum/.

And www.athensattica.com/things-to-see/sigjhtseeing/acropolis/.

Now if you’ve been following my Greek odyssey then the Gods will be pleased.

If not… then I’m not going to let you off the hook so easily… Flyday Friday… avert a Greek tragedy, Holiday Snaps – Postcard from Kethyra 🇬🇷.

I ought to trademark that.

It is an oft-asked question… where to get the sun in winter?

And I do my best to answer it. Kethyra, my new fave island, for sure www.kythera.gr/en/.

The rest I leave to my friends at TUI.

They are flagging up the Canaries which I have fond memories of from my trip to Tenerife earlier this month www.tenerifeturismo.com.

And here are a few thoughts which I will throw together in an actual grown-up story soon.

Dublin to Gran Canaria, seven nights, staying at the 3* Monte Feliz, Bahia Feliz is from €689pps.

Or Dublin to Tenerife, staying at the 3* Hotel Catalonia Las Vegas in Puerto de La Cruz, January 20.

Visit www.tui.ie.

This Sporting Weekend should this week be bringing you tales of derring-do from the World Cup in Japan.

But let’s derring-don’t.

Because if you’ve been following me these last couple of days you’ll know I’ve been in Athens and Kethyra.

Where the oval ball is all Greek to them.

You can always pick up the current thing in a country from the telly, and that word must have a Greek root.

The basketball is on when we visit and every public grounds seem to have basketball hoops and small five-a-side goals.

For those who like their basketball they’ll know that one of the best players in the NBA is known as the Greek Freak.

And you’re going to ask me his name… well, I’ll be here typing for ever!

One of the joys of the Greek Islands (yes, I get it) is being able to go for a dip without freezing your helix off.

Choose from any one of three seas… the Aegean, Ionian and Cyclades and a plethora of gulfs.

Or the swimming pool at the El Sol Hotel with the best views of Chora Castle. www.elsolhotel.gr/en/.

If the Gods are watching I hope my efforts in the swimming pool meet their approval up on Mount Olympus.

Although for a modern audience I keep my swimming trunks on.

The home of the Olympics, I passed by the stadium which was used for the first modern games in 1896.

It has a magical distressed classical look about it, is centrally located and you don’t need to be a marathon runner to get to it.

The Acropolis anyone?

I’m told it’s an hour’s walk – uphill. With my powers of navigation I reckon I’d either be walking 26 miles 385m in some direction.

Or end up in Marathon.

See www.kythera.gr/en/. And follow my odyssey… Flyday Friday… avert a Greek tragedy. Holiday Snaps – Postcard from Kethyra 🇬🇷.

Island time is learned. And there is no use fighting it.

Thankfully we have a Frenchman, Ludovic, in our party who seems to be born to this.

We are sat out on the front yard of a restaurant in Milliopotamus on the Attica island of Kythira, an hour’s fliight from Athens.

Waiting for our dinner.

Ludovic, who has been holding us up all trip, setting up his tripod to take pictures is laughing it off now at table.

Tapping at his pipe and shrugging Gallically.

We have had to postpone our trip to the waterfall by the village until this morning because it has got too dark.

Ludovic had to buy the whole supply of Poke Mon stickers in a souvenir shop in Choura for his son.

They are €1.20 here as opposed to €5 in France.

We are set under what we hope are vine trees beside a Greek Orthodox church. And praying dinner will come soon.

But we have the best company, Dutch, Belgian, German, French, Irish-Scors and, of course, Greek.

The Mayor no less, our group hosts, and a little ginger friend for cuddles… don’t tell the wife.

We are drinking fatourade, a spicy warming local liquor which the restaurant has kindly brought a couple of mini-carafes of.

To warm us as Kythera cools. It is 8pm. Or whatever time the Gods have on that big egg-timer they have on Mount Olympus.

When our meal comes an hour later it is worth waiting for, Greek salads, of course, and a new one for me here spinach pie.

I need the Popeye strength.

And a lamb which has been working out too… it’s huge.

All lubricated with vino, although in the dying light the third carafe of red looked pink.

St John the Evangelist was thrown off the island we are told earlier in the day.

I fear Ludovic will have us expelled too.

We are here as guests of the Attica region and have been flown here by Lufthansa www.lufthansa.com www.aegeanair.com and Aegean and Olympic www.olympicair.com airlines.

Visit www.kythira.com/in/mylopotamus/, www.kythira.com/portfolio-items/m1-chora-kapsali-chora. www.kythira.gr/en/whattosee/kapsali.php

And the hotel with the best views of Chora Castle www.elsolhotel.gr/en/

Or… A Poxy Lift Now!

The Ergon House Athens www.house.ergonfoods.com puts on a fantastic spread… four in fact.

And their staff will do anything for you.

Including freeing you from a lift you get stuck in for 45 minutes with your eight-strong international party.

And no it wasn’t because we were over the weight allowance after eating…

Salads, Greek specialities, meats and dessert.

We were on the balcony of the restaurant which is a working food market where the foods are sold and also used for your tasty meals.

And the setting is idyllic with a tree in the middle.

We were delighted to be sat here, and to have a view of the tree and the diners below.

Until it came time to leave.

Not being able to find stairs we took the lift.

Which ground to a halt on the er, ground floor.

At which point I’d like to tell you I went into full Hercules mode.

Instead I let born leader Thibault take control.

He organised with the staff that they fetch a seat. Not to sit in, Doh!

But to force a chair leg through to create a gap so we could breathe more easily.

While we waited for the firemen.

And he also got them to send bottles of water through.

Bravo Thibault.

A good night’s sleep at the Athens InterContinental www.athanaeum.intercontinental.com/en, although never ling enough and I was bouncing again.

And up for the next leg of my Greek odyssey…. Flyday Friday… averting a Greek disaster.

Also visit www.aia.gr.

A big shout-out to Dani at Lufthansa www.lufthansa.com for averting… or at least postponing a Greek tragedy.

Your globetrotting pal was standing in splendid ignorance by the coffee machine by the Lufthansa gate ready to pass through for his flight.

To Athens.

Of course he should have been on another level with Aegean Airlines www.aegeanair.com, operated by Lufthansa.

It’s there in small sprint on your ticket underneath Lufthansa.

Which was how I came to be directed here.

The boards? Yes, both flights were leaving at roughly the same time.

Cue a mad dash across the airport, and didn’t there just have to be a train too?

Needless to say the gate had just shut five minutes earlier when a sweaty, beardie bandana-wearing Scotsman rolled up.

There is as much chance negotiating Brexit than trying to get on a flight after boarding time.

So here I was stranded in Munich while my party was flying into Athens from all points in Europe.

To enjoy the spectacles of the Parthenon sans beardie Scotsman.

And that’s when Dani stepped in to avoid crisis (another Greek word, see you do know the language without knowing it).

Now I’ve perfected the little boy lost look through 53 years of being run by my Dear Old Mum and The Scary One and being a little boy lost.

And after ten minutes of button pressing on her computer and disapproving looks up from said terminal I had in my sweaty paw a new ticket for five hours’ time.

Too late to join up with my party for the Parthenon leg although I will see it from the road in the centre of Athens.

And the outskirts.

But heck, it’s not going anywhere, although I am…

On a small Greek airplane to Kethyra, one of the four islands in Attica, Athens’ region.

Now what could I possibly get wrong there?

Visit the airline sites above. It really does pay to take a one-stop to save on costs.

Island time

I really need another airport, a board of endless destinations, these ones new to me.

And more queues.

But no pain, no gain.

I am in the Athens International E Venizelos, nice and early… two hours to be precise.

With a throng of island hoppers although I think the better collective noun would be archipelago.

Venizelos was built for the 2004 Olympic Games and I have my athletic vibe on having passed by the site of the first Modern Games of 1896.

And I will be swimming and trekking in Kythira, although I know that isn’t an Olympic sport yet.

Visit http://www.olympicair.com for prices for island hopping.

And some more sites: www.kythera.gr/en/whattosee/kapsali.php and www.aia.gr

And some light reading on whiling the way away in an airport Hungry and Thursday – Beerfests.

And remember Friday is Flyday Friday… Flyday Friday – Virgin vs plastic.

Or how about a e of two planes, a seaplane in the Maldives and three time zones in Atoll tale on this site.

And because the world keeps travelling even when I’m travelling…

A million reasons

Ryanair has a seat sale… and is offering €30 off return flights on 1million seats to any of their 200 destinations.

Visit www.ryanair.com.

Aer Lingus sale

Ireland’s national airliner’s September sale ends Monday midnight.

I’ve reconnected with many of my favourite places in the trip I’m doing through the international party I’m with.

And more of them in due course.

For now, I’m sorry to my new Belgian pal Charlotte for chewing her ear off as she tried to keep her eyes focused on the road.

No she wasn’t driving but she was suffering from Travel sickness.

But we talked our shared love of Belgium.

Aer Lingus www.aerlingus.com has winter city breaks from €24.99 including Brussels from €34.99.

She told me about some great Belgian beers I’d never tried… and will now just have to show me.

And in amongst my World War I Battlefields is a tale about Tom’s Bierhsus In Flanders fields.

The Aer Lingus sale are for one-way fares for travel between October 1 and December 16.

MEET YOU IN THE SKIES

I’ve been delayed here in Munich Airport on my way to Athens so I’ve been browsing through the kerching stores.

Ot whatever the German is for them.

Although now that I think of it they probably invented the word such is their love of the oul’ onomatopoeia.

And I’m happy to report that there’s Oktoberfest paraphernalia everywhere.

Just as there was back in the mid-Eighties when I went on an Aussie and Kiwi booze bus to Munich.

Of course, you’ve heard me relay the legend of Brownie, Smutley and Rambo before.

But really this holiday was just the gift that kept on giving.

The deal was that everyone put into the kitty, went to the camp shop, and took a turn at cooking.

And when it was Peter and Steve’s turn, to give them their Sunday names, they rustled up a breakfast of champions.

They were cooks by trade.

But when it came to Peter’s go he just went out and bought schnapps.

And we all got shitfaced as he was prone to say.

So what did we eat in Munich?

Well plenty of bratwurst obvs but they also like to roast half a chickens and serve it up with cabbage and onions.

On a revolving grill like a kebab.

They think is a good idea after a skinful of beer and before and after a rollercoaster.

The Oktoberfest, despite its name, begins in September, this Saturday in fact, and ends on Sunday, October 6. See www.oktoberfest.de.

I’ll maybe compile it all in an oul’ story for you one of these days but for now can you settle for boozy tales from Dresden Dresden’s renaissance and Hamburg Ich bin ein Hamburger?

And, no, I did not miss the plane on account of being in the bar drinking steins. Probably.

For more on Munich www.muenchen.de and Germany www.germany.travel.

MEET YOU IN THE BAR