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Folegandros - Chora

Added: August 04, 2013

Tags: Folegandros Greece architecture church photos town
The second island belonging to Cyclades we had visited was Φολέγανδρος. What a difference to Santorini. I don't mean different geology, but how I felt there. While Santorini is touristy, busy and commercial, Folegandros is quiet and not many tourists find it. Locals live their lives and that is part of its magic.

I felt much better in Foldegandros than in Santorini. Finally we had an option to relax. Lonely Planet said it nicely: "Turn off the clocks on dreamy Folegandros". Some people might say there is nothing on Folegandros, but for me that is the point. 3 or 4 full days are probably sufficient to see everything interesting, but more might be needed for proper relaxing. We have been there for 3 days (arriving in the morning of the first day and leaving in the evening of the 3rd day) and certainly we could stay longer.

There are 3 towns in Folegandros. I will show Chora (Χώρα) now, Karavostasis and Ano Meria next time.

You can walk around whole town pretty quickly, even at leisure pace. Houses seem to be even whiter than in Santorini and I liked them more. Because they seemed to be more organic, with rounded corners, they had more colorful accents, simply their character was unique in my eyes.

Don't miss local bakery where they sell better baklava than I could find in Fira. Cheaper too. Shopping for food was different experience though. They don't speak English much, in some shops they don't speak at all. To the point they ignore you. But they understand Euro, so if you managed to find out all you wanted you should be fine :-)

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You could notice on these photos, the streets were empty. Contrary to Santorini, where I had problem to make a photo without many people. Yet another reason to like it here :-)

But certainly it was not a ghost town. There were local people, but sitting in shade of trees, in tavernas and more people came out in the evening. The same is valid also for tourists.

Kastro

The most interesting place in Chora is Kastro. It is fortified part of town from 13th century. I missed entry at least 3 times, because I though it is entry to hotel with the same name. Fortunately Zuzka insisted we have not seen it yet, and should be looking for it better.

BTW picture from Kastro was the reason we went to Folegandros and not to other island. Plus a promise of quiet place.

As you can see, people live here. And there are also traces of children :-)
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There are many hotels in Chora of all price levels. So everybody should be satisfied. These caught my attention due to of flowers (and maybe also sunset). Otherwise I don't specialize in hotel photography at all :-) With one difference. There will be many photos of our accommodation Kamares next time...

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Nature around Chora

Chora resides nicely in its surroundings. There is wonderfully blue sea just below the cliff it sits on, there are nice terrace fields to the west and southern part of Chora is spread out on nearby hill side.

A view directly from one of squares. I will show photo of the steep cliff offering this view next time.
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Terraced fields directly outside of Chora.
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