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Patmos > Apocalypse Now July 10, 2006

Nineteen hundred years ago, Saint John the Apostle went to Patmos and wrote the Book of Revelation. Today, the tiny Greek island is still a vision to behold.

Nineteen centuries ago, a Roman galley ship brought John the Apostle through the same waters I am cruising now, heading toward the same destination: the tiny Aegean island of Patmos. All these years later, a boat is still the only way to get here. My ferry has been steaming east from Athens for nine hours and now, at 2 a.m., the island finally appears on the horizon, a deeper scribble of black against the blackness of the sea at night. I wonder whether John arrived at night, whether he too saw the stars above the island glittering in the colors that emerge so far from city light — amber, red, pale green, blue-white, pink, the glittering white of no-color. I have the leisure to notice such things, but John — witness at Christ’s Crucifixion and author of the last of the four Gospels — came here in chains, a man in his nineties, condemned to exile by the Roman Emperor Domitian. His crime: Being a Christian, and a prince of the early church.

I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ. I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day, and heard behind me a great voice, as of a trumpet, Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book . . .

REVELATION 1:9-11

The book John wrote on Patmos is the Book of Revelation — the final book of the New Testament, a hallucinatory tapestry of hail, fire and blood, of six-winged beasts and human-faced locusts, of angels clothed in cloud, capped with rainbows and walking on legs like pillars of fire, of saints singing praise in the golden streets of an eternal Jerusalem. John wrote it in the form of letters to the seven major churches scattered across what was then the heathen Roman province of Asia Minor, now western Turkey. In the nearly two millenniums since he dictated his vision in a humble Patmos cave, Revelation’s images have been fodder for cults, horror movies and powerful Sunday sermons. They have given comfort to the doubting, doubt to the comfortable and, over and over again, have been used to predict imminent Apocalypse. In short, the Book of Revelation brought into the world some of the most potent words and images Western culture has known. I have come to Patmos to see what remnants of such a powerful dream may linger in the island’s air, its rock, its waters and its holy places.

At sunrise, a chorus of roosters jerks me from a luminous and hectic dream. I sit at the bed’s edge trying to connect disjointed images but losing them. All that remains is a sense of sound and color. Later I will find out it is a common place of conversation on Patmos: What did you dream last night? Vivid dreams, it turns out, remain a part of everyday life here.

The roosters crow for half an hour, then break off. I sleep again, for an hour or two, before I get up to eat breakfast and explore.

A small, volcanic island shaped like a hook and dotted with minor peaks, Patmos is one of the northernmost of Greece’s Dodecanese Islands, which are scattered like a broken necklace along the western coast. Only about a thousand people live here year-round, most of them in the port town of Skala, but others are scattered in smaller fishing villages dotting the island’s other harbors. While tourists from all over the world ferry among the Grecian islands every season, Patmos is rarely on the itineraries of big tour groups and travel planners, which tend to favor the better-known, more culturally rich or tonier islands of Crete, Rhodes, Santorini, Mykonos and others. Patmos is known primarily as the place Revelation was written and as home to two important shrines: the Holy Cave of the Apocalypse and the Monastery of St. John the Divine. The island receives a steady stream of day-trippers ferrying in from other nearby islands, and a regular dose of Christian pilgrims who seek it out to pay tribute. (more…)

A popular place in the sun > Mykonos July 10, 2006

The young and beautiful types who flock to the island of Mykonos come in search of Paradise.

At first sight, Mykonos looks like most other Greek islands – arid, rocky and strewn with dazzling white sugar-cube houses. Take a closer look and you discover a hedonistic world of style slaves on scooters, scrambling around a pot-holed paradise in search of seventh heaven.

I arrived in time to head for the beach and soak up the last rays of the late afternoon sun. By 6pm, at the wooden beach bar at the end of Super Paradise beach, a horde of silver-bikini-clad girls and sarong-wrapped boys were jumping and gyrating to their favourite dance tunes around a swimming pool. Meanwhile, at the Coca Club bar at the other end of the beach, a group of nice young men wearing the latest Dolce & Gabbana swimming trunks were dancing with each other and posing around a pool built on top of a rocky outcrop.

The capital of gay travel destinations for many years, Mykonos has metamorphosed into one of the most stylish – and expensive – of the Aegean islands. During the season planeloads of fashionable Italian, French and German tourists of all descriptions drop from the sky to enjoy life on the island where Shirley Valentine jumped ship.

It is easy to see why Mykonos first became so popular – it has all the quintessential ingredients: an attractive whitewashed town built around a picture-postcard harbour complete with windmills, bright white houses with blue or green shutters, hundreds of pretty pink- and blue-domed chapels, numerous rocky coves and sandy bays with sparkling clear waters, and, of course, an airport.

There are only two difficult decisions to be made here each day: which beach to favour and where to have dinner. The first depends on the demographic to which you belong, where you are staying and what transport you have. The second depends on whether you want to eat Greek or sample the numerous other cuisines on offer.

Surprisingly, on an island measuring nine miles by six, you are spoilt for beach choice. The busiest are those south of Mykonos Town and the farther away you get, the more chance you have of finding more space. The main beaches are well serviced by the local buses, which run frequently during the day and into the night, though many visitors prefer to hire a scooter.

At beach rush hour the landscape resembles a dusty Scalextric track, with motorcycles and Jeeps hurtling beautiful people along the narrow switchback lanes. A more relaxing alternative is to take one of the local caiques, the pretty little boats that line Mykonos harbour and ferry you to Paradise Beach and beyond.

I’d imagined that with names like Paradise and Super Paradise, the beaches would go on for ever, but they don’t. Approached from on high, down treacherously steep rocky roads, they at first appear diminutive, dotted with sun loungers and wooden umbrellas. Paradise is very much the preserve of the twentysomethings (and those who still think they are), and has the unfortunate distinction of being approached via a camp site. Super Paradise is also for a youngish and more affluent crowd (predominantly gay at one end).

I hired a car and spent most of my days farther afield on Elia beach, favoured by an older crowd and the likes of fashion designer Jean-Paul Gaultier, who was there most days with his jolly Euro-chums. Bikini-wearing Greek girls with walkie-talkies walk back and forth along one of the island’s longest stretches of sand, taking drink and food orders from the local taverna. Here, as on the other beaches, you’d be forgiven for thinking that the sarong is the island’s national dress for both sexes.

For exercise, the swimming and snorkelling opportunities around the rocks at the far end of the beach are fantastic. If you feel so inclined, you can water-ski, ride on a big yellow banana or be hurtled around in a rubber ring behind a speedboat.

Most of the southern beaches are approached via steep cliff paths and it is possible to walk from one to the other, but few do. I got as far as walking 10 minutes over the rocks to neighbouring Agrari beach and had lunch in the delightful flower garden of the cafe there. With safe, shallow waters, the beaches immediately south of Mykonos Town – Ornos, Psarou and Plati Yialos – are ideal for families.

Each evening, around 7pm, I dragged myself away from my lounger and explored a different part of the island. Here a car is essential because the roads are poor and at times I wished I’d had a four-wheel drive as I rolled backwards down a dusty dirt track. The northern beaches of Panormos and Agios Sostis are worth finding as few tourists venture there. For the best sunset moment, a drink at Manoula’s at Agios Giannis in the west is recommended. If you happen to be in Mykonos Town, have a sundowner at the Scarpa cocktail bar in Little Venice, so called because the high, Venetian-style buildings are built up from the lapping water’s edge.

Mykonos Town is a labyrinth of pristine, narrow whitewashed lanes, originally designed to baffle invading pirates. Today they confuse the tourists who repeatedly shuffle and funnel past the designer boutiques, bars and restaurants. Find your bearings by identifying the three main streets, Matogianni, Enoplon Dynameon and Mitropoleos and you shouldn’t go far wrong. One moment you are passing the windows of stores that stay open until well after midnight, selling Armani and Moschino; the next, you are looking in through an open doorway to see a traditional Greek granny dressed in black wielding a brightly coloured fly-swat.

The later it grows, the louder it becomes, with music pumping out from the disco bars – most of the nightlife doesn’t ignite until 2am. The best restaurants are around Kalogera, off Matogianni. At Chez Maria’s Garden, under an arbour groaning from the weight of bougainvillea, a candlelit feast awaits you, but expect to pay at least €50 per head. At La Maison de Katrine, you can relish some fine French cooking; for variety, try La Mexicana.

For the ultimate dinner I headed for the Kivotos Club Hotel in Ornos. On a pretty terrace overlooking the hotel’s Greek folly gardens and Ornos Bay, I ate a salad of smoked salmon with avocado, coriander seeds, basmati rice and rocket, followed by black tortelloni with truffle in a Champagne and truffle sauce. The bill came to a staggering – by Greek standards – €85 per head and the service was snooty.

I stayed in more humble surroundings – a simple, self-catering studio in Agios Stefanos, a sleepy little hillside hamlet a couple of miles north of Mykonos Town. No pumping disco music here to keep me awake, only the barking of dogs and the crowing of cockerels heralding the dawn.

On my one big night out early in the week, I danced in Sabbia’s – a minimalist chrome, glass and steel establishment where we were encouraged to dance on the tables. We decided to jump in a taxi to Cavo Paradiso, the cliff-top open-air club above Paradise Beach that opens at 3am and goes on until well after dawn. Around the open-air pool we swayed on the concrete terraces until 5am and left in a cloud of dust as revellers were still arriving.

Most nights, though, I was tucked up by midnight, which explained why I was usually on the beach about four hours before everyone else, and why, on the night before I left, when I bumped into some friends again, they looked paler than before, proving that everyone has a different vision of paradise.