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Efharisto Rhodes you are Colossal

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Efharisto Rhodes you are colossal and as we say Yassas at the end of our loveholidays odyssey we reflect on the legends we have met.

Michael, the pick-up driver who took us on our first night to the Amphitryon Hotel.

May you make enough from your driving and your day building job to realise your ambition to settle down and slow down in your 40s.

Manolis, our bar manager who patiently and smilingly put up with this Bandanaman mangling his language.

To you and those who fed us so fully a Yamas (or cheers).

Over an ouzo with the best Greek traditional band Bouzouki playing in the background.

Yamas to new friends

To the new friends we met, the Three Yorkshiremen and Jay, Cherry and Jane.

And thanks for the offer of your room on the day of your check-out Jane.

Only I am still haunted by another invitation from my Athens odyssey.

And Toy Boy Brian, OK, he’s a fellow Sixtysomething like myself but travels the world selling vintage toys.

And meets celebs and gets the VIP treatment, hence him meeting the Bandanaman.

Then, of course, the army of cats who responded to our cheery kalimera.

Even when noon had passed and it should be a kalispera.

Especially Symi2, our forever friend who took residence of our laps.

And whose picture will now occupy a place on our crowded fridge.

Legends carved in rock

It is back now to chilly North Berwickety in Scotland where Rufus Rules now has a lot of living up to and explaining.

But not before a nod to the legends who come out at night.

Now Rhodes is clearly not shy of gods carved into rock.

But Nicklas and Despina are the god and goddess of rock at the Legends Rock Bar in Old Rhodes town.

Downing shots as they serve and producing a bottle of Bunnahabhain smoky Islay whisky and testing me on my Scottishness.

By asking me to pronounce it which incidentally is Bunahaveain.

And all the time Nikos the singer, of course, belts out the standards from across the rocky lane.

Reading the words perfectly from his screen which is no mean feat when it’s Cher’s warbling.

Kalinihta and dreams of gold

I leave with a kalinihta and breathe a sigh of relief that I have not said anything inappropriate.

As happened when I greeted the concierge in Rome with a buona notte e sogni d’oro.

But come to think of it, good night and dreams of gold does sound a fitting farewell to Helios, the Sun God’s island, Rhodes.

Your friendly neighbourhood Bandanaman is travelling with loveholidays and EasyJet from Edinburgh.

And staying at the Amphitryon City Hotel, 800m from the Old Town.

All for £1,028 for two, B&B and evening meals, for a week with airport transfers.

Countries, Deals, Europe, Sport

Fun and Games in Rhodes

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And as stadiums go this one has real history, where the locals have been coming for 2,500 years for fun and Games in Rhodes.

And apologies here for breaking with tradition and keeping my kit on at the Rhodes Acropolis.

The original Halieia athletes going commando for the 600ft race in honour of Helios the Sun God.

There was, of course, a time as a Scottish Cross Country champion when I held high hopes of an Olympic future.

But while I puff and pant for picture purposes a local hero barely breaks a sweat circling the stadium.

Unfortunately for Dimitrios there are but one or two in the stone seats today where once 30,000 cheered on their heroes.

The future champions

Greece lightning: Running is in the blood

The Stadium and the Acropolis complex on the outskirts of Rhodes is packed today with future champions.

With the Acropolis the place where Rhodian families come to play on a Sunday.

With kids kicking a ball around while dads dribble a basketball, mums chat around prams and grandparents sit and smoke in the cafe.

We bus it to the Acropolis from Rhodes Town harbour only to do a double take when it circled around past our hotel, the Amphitryon.

You can too take a hop-on, hop-off coach which will cost you €20 of today’s coin which will also take you to the Old Town.

But better still you could show your athleticism by walking the couple of kilometres to the Acropolis.

The stuff of Legends

Passing the baton: She’s relay something

It feels right to spend our last full day cosplaying Ancient Rhodian heroes in the iconic tree-lined Stadium.

Although we are not quite finished with Rhodes yet as we will spend the evening back in Rhodes Old Town with the Legends of today.

But you will just have to wait for the next instalment of our Rhodes odyssey for that.

Your friendly neighbourhood Bandanaman is travelling with loveholidays and EasyJet from Edinburgh.

And staying at the Amphitryon City Hotel, 800m from the Old Town.

All for £1,028 for two, B&B and evening meals, for a week with airport transfers.

Countries, Deals, Europe

Symi, see you, Symi 2

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And seeing we’ve got Helios the Sun God back on side we’re off Greek island hopping, so SYMI, see you, SYMI 2.

All of which will become as clear in time as the Aegean we’re sailing on to the Rhodes neighbouring island on our loveholidays odyssey.

Where after an hour and a half on the water on our Sea Dreams boat Symi 2.

The pristine blue and white Captains Houses and neo-classical mansions around Gialos harbour and hills hove into view.

We dive into island life though not literally.

Dive straight in

We will leave that to the likes of the moustachioed Stathis Hatzis, the legendary naked diver who stands sentry at the bay.

Who we learn dived to retrieve and tie an Italian anchor, holding his breath for nearly four minutes.

Now did we say that Gialos is breathtaking?

Particularly from higher up, as you can see from the lens of the expert in the family.

We scale the steep steps after calamari and a kalimera and Greek salad at Trata Trawler.

And discover that the best welcome is from a friendly Simi cat we christen Simi 2 after our boat.

The best habits

Alas, the mechanical Symi 2’s hooter reminds us that we must part.

But hopefully our prayers will be answered at our next port of call, a monastery on the north end of the island.

Greek churches as we have all come to appreciate appreciate their icons and you can’t move for them here.

At the Holy Monastery of the Taxiarch Michael Panarmitis.

Again, we bump into a Greek Orthodox priest in flowing black robe.

Now he may or may not know our Archbishop Makarios back at the Alphatron Hotel in Rhodes.

But we imagine he will be waiting near the bar for his liqueur as he has been all week.

Though not necessarily for us.

The cat’s whiskers of a deal

But Socrates, the hotel cat… OK, not the only one but the one we took to first will be.

And he can have the Amphitryon because Simi belongs to Symi 2.

Your friendly neighbourhood Bandanaman is travelling with loveholidays and EasyJet from Edinburgh.

And staying at the Amphitryon City Hotel, 800m from the Old Town.

All for £1,028 for two, B&B and evening meals, for a week with airport transfers.

Countries, Deals, Europe

When it rains on the Sun God’s island

18th April 202618th April 2026 funtime65

So where to go when it rains on the Sun God’s island of Rhodes?

What we’d done to offend Zeus on Mount Olympus or whether Helios was away, we need shelter from their wrath.

And that means a visit to the Throne of Helios opposite the harbour off the Old Town.

For the 9D spectacular of the history of Rhodes, the first of its type in Europe, and a very special chariot race.

Hair-raising stuff

Spooktacular: History lesson in Throne of Helios

You literally don’t have to leave your seat for a rocky thrill ride.

Although even inside the repurposed original Rhodian cinema, 100 years old next year, you won’t be entirely dry.

As you’ll get sprayed with water from the sea.

Caught up in a battle, rocked by an earthquake and sprayed with smoke.

And bumped from the back.

All of which might illicit a scream of ‘what, I’ve just done my hair.’

Up close with Helios

The Throne of Helios is a 20-minute riproaring thrill ride which will occupy kids and big kids, rain or shine.

And for just €13 of our modern coin you’ll forget that Helios has taken a day off and believe he is actually in here.

Of course, all good things must come to an end and it’s back out into the elements.

Stone me: Larking in the Archaeological Museum

But there is immediate help at hand in Umbrella Corner, where you have a choice of brolly good specialist shops.

With your Bandanaman hooded and Medusa covering her strands with her newly acquired brolly we go to have a word with Helios.

Where he was, or perhaps his spirit still is, between the two piers where the 80m Colossus in his memory is said to have stood.

At home among the old fossils

Peering enviously at the big yachts with Russian names nyet no reprieve.

We trudge back into the Old Town for our next stop.

And a step back in time at the Archaeological Museum.

And an education, and then some, of the civilisations which have passed through Rhodos.

For the overgrown schoolboys (guilty) and schoolgirls (a group of giggly gals from my hometown of Glasgow) there are naughty bits.

Greek busts and phallises but also beautifully preserved amphoras or jugs.

And on the grander scale statues to the gods and headstones.

The ancient and the modern

It is though in the small things that we often find God’s most wondrous hand.

And it takes some comprehending that the tiniest hedgehogs and frogs from thousands of years ago are preserved so beautifully.

Whether Helios had a late one he is arisen and shining now and we are ready to embrace his creation again.

Which for my goddess means a refuel at our now favourite stopping off point, Socrates Garden.

Before a shopping expedition around some very well-thumbed stall items.

Now that’s a whole different odyssey of epic proportions.’

Deal me in

Your friendly neighbourhood Bandanaman is travelling with loveholidays and EasyJet from Edinburgh.

And staying at the Amphitryon City Hotel, 800m from the Old Town.

All for £1,028 for two, B&B and evening meals, for a week with airport transfers.