It is April 1st, otherwise known in the US as April Fools Day. As we board the plane, we have to pinch ourselves to make sure this is not a joke, lol. It took unbelievable patience and persistence to get to this point. Honestly, both David and I feel we have aged 10 years in the last two trying to get to where we are now. Lack of exercise, healthy food choices, dealing with Greek bureaucracy and overall stress of living out of suitcases/without our house items has created this situation. However, looking on the bright side, we are finally back on track to creating a new lifestyle of our choosing.
Delta Airlines: Austin – JFK – Athens
Evia (Central Region)
First stop – the island of Evia. So over these last two years, David and I have become experts in house searches. We watch YouTube videos (of course most of them are out of our price range, but still…..), but mostly I do searches on the website spitogatos.gr. It’s a pretty good website, and I’ve gotten pretty good at weeding out the “low hanging fruit” of houses, and zeroing into items that meet our criteria. We’re looking for a house that’s at least 200m2 , open floor plan, bedrooms w/ensuite (for our guests), outdoor kitchen, 1/2 acre +, separate space for David’s art studio, and most importantly, a sea view. Very tall order, especially at our price range.
I can’t tell you how many houses we saw that met our criteria, only to see them be sold before we could make it across the pond to look at them. I would get emotionally attached to a house, literally place our belongings in the photos and move-in in my mind. And then they sell and I start the process over again with another house. I swore I would never get emotionally attached again……and the the house in Evia appeared. I LOVED that house. It had our name written all over it. Ironically, I fell in love with it 6 months before I even knew there was a YouTube video. Here’s the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kcl69JsMHuQ&t=3s
It literally checked every box on our list. The upstairs was unfinished, but would have been David’s area. Well, you guessed it – sold. I was crushed! We looked at the other house on our list but it was not the same. Yes, there will be other houses, but I really thought that was the one!
Here’s a photo of sunset at our hotel, which was right on the beach.
We did get a chance to see some sights before heading to our next destination.
To get to our next stop (Nafplio) – we boarded a ferry at Eretria, across the South Euboean Gulf to Skala Oropou, which is just north of Athens. This ferry runs every hour – about 20 min each way, easy on easy off. Only 13 euro!
Nafplion (Pelopannese)
For logistic purposes, the drive from the port of Oropou to the city of Nafplion takes a little over two hours. On the way, we stopped for lunch just outside Corinth at a cute little restaurant right on the beach. Another tasty & fresh meal. Of course the weather was perfect for outside dining!
So we booked a small one bedroom Airbnb in the heart of Nafplio thinking we will have easy access to places and our car. it is a cute little place at the top of the hill with a great view. One thing to note – at the top of a hill……. We have to park on the street at the bottom of the hill as our car will not fit, nor has the power to make it up the hill. That means we either walk up the hill from another street, or go up the steps….a lot of steps. We’re talking up the steps with groceries, etc. This picture doesn’t do it justice – this was halfway up the stairs, one of many “resting” points. We are getting better though – free outdoor stair stepper!
At the bottom of those evil stairs is the first of many ruins/historic sites in the city of Nafplio – the Lion of the Bavarians. We can practically see the lion from our Airbnb. Nestled in the middle of a neighborhood.
Known as the Lion of Bavaria, this sculpture dates from 1840-1841. Below the sculpture is an inscription in German explaining the monument was commissioned by Ludwig of Bavaria, father of Otto, the first King of Greece. The monument was made in memory of the Bavarian soldiers who died during the typhoid epidemic of 1833-34, while escorting the King through Nafplion.
The bird sound you hear in the video is from one of the neighbors in the apartments across the way. We hear him every morning. Actually kind of nice.
Our reason for coming to Nafplio was to look for houses. I had been watching this particular one online for several months, and now the price has been reduced considerably. David and I call it the “Grande Dame”. It has been abandoned for many years since the owner passed away. In the houses hey day, it had all the latest features: marble floors, state of the art appliances, open layout, etc. It would be truly magnificent with renovations, and the price is about right to make it happen. Here’s the YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdboXt1T8p8&list=PPSV We are considering it, but we still have other houses to see (namely Crete and Rhodes), but we will keep it on our list.
And now – onto the best foods of Greece. They might not all be good food choices, but they tasted great going down.
Old Town Nafplion is simply charming. The tiled streets are wide and clean. Again, perfect time of the year to visit as there weren’t too many tourists.
The Fortress of Palimidi
Our first outing in Nafplion was just a hop, skip and jump away from our apartment. We can see the fortress from our terrace actually. We arrived around 8:30-ish in the morning and other than 2-3 other people, had the entire place to ourselves. It was a perfect, cloudless day – not too hot or cold – just right. Glory to God! The fortress was built by the Venetians during their second occupation of the area (1686–1715). In 1715 it was captured by the Ottomans and remained under their control until 1822, when it was captured by the Greeks.
Epidaurus (Επίδαυρος)
Epidaurus was a small city in ancient Greece, on the Argolid Peninsula, just north of Nafplion. It’s claim to fame is it’s 4th-century bc temple of Asclepius, the god of healing. We spent the day exploring the ruins and visiting the museum. Another beautiful day, not too hot with not too many people.
Kalamata (Peloponnese)
Kalamata is surprisingly busy. What a vibrant town, full of activity! It’s like a mini-Athens, with a population around 70k. Everyone speaks English as well as Greek. If you are thinking of moving to Greece, but want to be near all the amenities and infrastructure, as well as live in a beautiful setting, this is your town. The only thing I advise is to not use a car, or get a very SMALL car. I thought Nafplio was a little crazy with double parked tiny streets…..let me tell you, they are triple and quadruple parked here. It is unbelievable. These drivers are fearless! I would show you some pictures, but I was too occupied fearing for my life to take photos.
Unfortunately, our time here has not been as productive house hunting wise. The housing market here is sky high and out of our price range for the items we are looking for, so no house hunting, although the local real estate company is keeping a lookout for us. David’s consulting business has also had an uptick while we’ve been here, causing us to be homebound for some days. Luckily, our Airbnb is quite comfortable.
One of the advantages of living in Greece, is that there is a Greek Orthodox Church within walking distance anywhere you go. Case in point – directly across the street from our Airbnb. I really love hearing those church bells!
One thing that was quite interesting – first time we’ve experienced this – a sandstorm! Dust clouds from the Sahara Desert blew across the Mediterranean and turned the sky some pretty freaky colors. The day started hazy, then turned brown and later a burnt orange. Good thing we had plenty of food as we stayed locked in the house. Kind of like a hurricane, lol!
Vonitsa/Paliampela (Central Region)
We were to meet my sister, her significant other (Pantelis) and his mother (Nikoleta), who were to arrive shortly before Pascha (Easter). Easter is a big deal in Greece – like really a big deal. This year especially, because of the date. May 1st (May Day) is a holiday here in Greece, so is the Monday after Easter. Because Easter fell on May 5th this year, Monday the 6th was an automatic holiday, and Tuesday the 7th was designated the holiday for May day. Therefore, there was the equivalent of a 5 day holiday break. This caused massive exodus in Athens with exiting roads and ferries filled to capacity. David and I had difficulty finding a place to stay in Vonitsa for this very reason. We did manage to find a nice Airbnb so all turned out well. Paliampela is a tiny village nestled up the hill from Vonitsa, which is also a tiny town, situated in the northwestern part of Aetolia-Acarnania. Our sole purpose here was to spend time with my sister. A side note – the last time my sister and I were together in Greece was with our parents in 1968 so this was a real treat. Anyway, Pantelis has a home here that he inherited so the two of them are renovating it. A cute little two bedroom house with a large wrap around terrace where you can see the country side for miles. Peaceful and lovely. The village of Paliampela is a typical tiny Greek village and is where Pantilis’ grew up. It is a typical Greek village where everybody knows everybody, and is in everyone’s business. There is one mini-mart, one restaurant, and two churches lol. That’s not counting the 4 or 5 churches in the immediate area. All of them were loved and well cared for. It’s about a 10 minute drive to Vonitsa, which has most of the amenities you need. Not a lot of choices, but you can get the basics.
Our first order of business was participating in Holy Week. I didn’t make all the services, but attended Holy Tuesday (Bridegroom), Friday (Lamentation), and of course the midnight service leading into Pascha. Both my sister and I have extensive background in byzantine choral music (her more than me) so we were both looking forward to hearing the rich sounds of authentic Greek chanting. Okay, so I knew it would be different, but wow, I was working hard to find a melody in what the chanter was producing. That was Tuesday. Friday was better, with the familiar melodies of the lamentations.
Here are the sights and sounds of Greek Orthodox Worship in Paliampela, Greece:
So this happened just outside our Airbnb. The feast of St. George was the day after Pascha. The tradition in Vonitsa is for local on horseback to start at the Church of Agios Georgios, then ride through the village to bless the homes. This custom
dates back to the Greek War of Independence of 1821 and is reenacted every year.
I will finish our tour of Vonitsa with this moment of zen……
On the way to Athens to catch our ferry to Crete, we stopped at a little out of the way restaurant for a little snack, lol!
Se we get on the ferry, and holy cow our cabin is huge!! No sitting in a cramped seat on an airplane. We did an overnight to Crete the civilized way. Not only that, but the fare was 230 euro – what a deal! Minoan Lines Ferry. Check out our excitement!
The Island of Crete
For the record, I never intended to like Crete. We were coming to see a couple of houses we found interesting, and everyone told us we would like the island. Sure, okay….. Well, I’ve got to say, I LOVE this island. We got off the boat in Heraklion and our rental car was right there waiting for us – no schlepping our luggage around. The drive to our Airbnb from Heraklion to Rethymno was a little over an hour. Since we arrived the Port of Heraklion at 7am in the morning and check in at the Airbnb wasn’t until the afternoon, we just took our time. The drive was amazing! Winding roads along the coast, higher and lower elevations – something you might see in the movies.
Since we got off the boat so early, we didn’t have our morning coffee fuel, so our first stop was a coffee/bakery in Rethymno – Kormos Bakery. David had a latte with a kotopita (chicken filo pie), and I had a double Greek coffee with a spanakopita (spinach filo pie). Hit the spot! While we were sitting there minding our own business, the owner brought us some loukoumades (greek donuts). What a surprise! We were delighted and thankful! On top of that, our Airbnb was ready for us way sooner than expected and was only a few minutes from the bakery. Off we went!
Up first was to schedule a visit to another house on our list. This one is about halfway between Rethymno and Chania, up in the mountains in the tiny village of Sellia. The floor plan is EXACTLY what I imagine our house should be. Each bedroom is ensuite and privately located away from the other bedrooms. Dream kitchen. Nice office for David. Really, everything (for me) is perfect! For David, not so much. No mancave/art studio space, and no view of the ocean (only mountain view). And the price is just out of our reach. Here’s the link to it. Seriously, you need to click on this link: https://youtu.be/jE4tWO7kL6s?si=T5j5u9lSdZaWjPnK The house is a bit difficult to get to, but it looks exactly as you see in the video. Everything from here on out will be compared to this house. The Grand Dame in Nafplio is still in the picture because the price is so affordable, but there are a lot of renovations, and just a hint of a view. The Grand Dame and this one are the two on our list so far.
Our next stop was to visit a couple I have known for a long time from the Clear Lake area of Houston. Cheryl and Greg spend 6 months a year here and have a home just outside Heraklion. We never really hung out together in Houston but we had mutual friends. Cheryl is a real estate agent with many years of experience. I reached out to her when I was planning our trip to Crete and asked her about one of the houses I was interested in. Well, she was all over it. You know, you can tell when somebody loves their profession when they embrace looking at houses on their off time. Cheryl is that person, and Greg offers very valuable insight in the construction and integrity of the houses. I was impressed and very grateful to them for devoting much of their time looking at houses with us.
Now I’m not gonna lie, I totally thought I was back in Austin when I saw this……
Okay, on to our next house. This is the real reason we came to Crete. We’ve been eyeing this house for a long time. Fixer upper on 1 1/2 acres with a knee buckling view. Stay tuned…..
Rhodes
It was time to head to Rhodes. While we were in Crete, my citizenship paperwork hit a stall. Apparently using my Greek maiden name as my middle name when I married David just blew the minds at the municipality of Rhodes, thus requiring new paperwork generated, with my name to be published in the Greek Gazette once more. We needed to remove “Tsimpris” from my documents. Can you believe they didn’t like my Greek name?
Fortunately, the update didn’t take too long and my final citizenship papers were completed on June 20, 2024 – about 11 days before the 90 day tourist deadline of which I entered the country on, using my U.S. passport.
Now, on to the next leg, which is the Greek ID card (ταυτοτητα). This had to be done in Rhodes as that is the municipality I was registered in. Kind of like a voter registration card for the state you live in……something like that.
I was looking forward to spending time in Rhodes for two reasons, one, we could save some money by staying in the family home, and two, the Kromerakis family would be there, namely the youngest one, my granddaughter, Anastasia. My daughter Andrea and I coordinated when we would arrive – She was coming from Athens a couple hours before David and I from Crete.
Much to my surprise, just before we boarded our flight, I started getting text messages of dreadful things that had happened to the family home. In this video, Andrea is doing a walk through and initially, she was thinking an earthquake caused a lot of damage. Slowly, to her horror, she realized the damage was caused by rats!
We obviously could not stay in the house so we frantically looked for other alternatives. Andrea was fortunate to find temporary digs until we could get into something more long term, but the thought of the family home being under rat control is a devastating feeling. To add to our distress, Andrea is pregnant with her 2nd child and her medical situation is high-risk. She should not be inside this house at all.
After this video was taken, we started working a plan on how to clean/disinfect/restore the home. Obviously, due to Andrea’s health and our age, we looked for professional house cleaners in addition to pest control and disinfection companies. Almost all the furniture had to be removed. So, we started the process. Unfortunately, with it being high tourist season, there were no housecleaning services to be had, so Ty did all the cleaning with me helping when I could. Not to go into a lot of detail, but it took a full month of non-stop cleaning, disinfecting, pest control, removing of furniture and replacing it, to make the house livable again.
A week into this whole disinfection process, Andrea had a health issue landing her in the local private hospital for 3 days. They took good care of her, but YiaYia and Pappou had a crash course in childcare. Stassi did great with us and we had a great time with her. I got my exercise playing with a toddler, that’s for sure! We did manage to have some nice family time together in the house we rented in Kremasti.
Intersolar 2024 – Munich
On David’s bucket list is Intersolar Conference Europe, which is the largest renewable energy conference in the world. Being in Europe last year didn’t work out for us so this was the year. At this conference, David would be able to see what European products are available in order to build a photovoltaic system for our house, plus, if he ever does European consulting work, knowledge of these products would be beneficial. The conference was June 19-21 in Munich, Germany. We left from Rhodes, and because we were a little late securing lodging, we stayed near the airport, so we didn’t get a chance to explore the city. Perhaps another time.
With many thanks and blessings to our neighbors Kiki and Christos, I was able to secure an appointment to obtain my Greek ID (taftotita). This was critical as it would save us 3% of our house purchase price (more on that later), plus with this, we can buy a car, and do all sorts of things in Greece. Unfortunately, I could not smile for the photo (which had to be taken twice due to a “hint” of a smile), and my hair had to be away from my face. So here’s my Greek soul crushing mug shot, lol!
Just when we were preparing to head back to Crete to sign papers on the house we’re buying, the beautiful ancestral home in Paradisi was ready to be occupied once more. We only spent one night at the home, but experienced the most beautiful sunset you only find on the west side of the island of Rhodes.
And, with that, it was time to head back to Crete to buy a house! Στην υγειά σας !!
Crete-Our new forever home….
So we’re back in Crete and we are laser focused on buying a house and building new infrastructure around a place we will spend the rest of our lives inhabiting. First up was signing the pre-contract to take the home off the market and proceed to the final closing. We were fortunate to have a recommendation from Amalia (remember Amalia’s Kitchen?) of a fabulous lawyer to help guide and protect us through the buying process. Alex is a wonderful human and we are so blessed to have his expertise. So, what’s the process of buying a house in Greece? Well, once you find a house and agree on a price, this is what goes down….
- Title Search. Done by the buyer to ensure the house is legal with a clear title. Alex did this for us.
- Civil Engineer/surveyor. Done by the buyer or seller to ensure the boundary lines are correct and the house is sound. Alex gave us the name of a Civil engineer who did a thorough examination of the structure.
- Conveyance Deed. This is provided by the seller which consists of a certificate of tax clearance, certificate of energy attributions, and a certificate of no illegal construction. This last point is where most home purchases go south. In our case, the pool was not legal (it was bigger and deeper than the original permitted plans)
- Property Tax Statement and Income Tax Statement. This is provided by the buyer
- Notary Fees. A notary is far more powerful than notaries in the U.S. I’m not sure if this is true in all cases, but our notary is a PhD in law. Buyer pays his fee.
- Realtor Fees. Generally paid for by both parties, around 1 1/2 – 2% of the purchase price.
- Land Registry. Paid by the buyer. About 0.7 to 0.8% of the price.
- 3% VAT on the sales price. Buyer pays. Now this one totally depends on a couple important things. If you are a citizen and this is your first home purchase, you do not have to pay this. A big financial reason/perk for me. Saved us a bunch of money.
These are general guidelines, but loosely speaking, the final price of a home is whatever the purchase price agreed upon with the seller, plus 10%.
We signed the Pre-Contract on July 24th and put 10% down. You would think signing such an important document that is all in Greek, with way different rules than you are used to, would be a harrowing experience, but honestly, David and I were quite comfortable with all the parties involved. Who was present? We met at the notary’s office with the two brothers (sellers), real estate agent, Alex, the notary and us. Truly a joyous occasion.
Okay, why did we choose this house? When we first saw it online, we thought it was a long shot. Too expensive, too big, too much work but killer view. Like such a magnificent view that David’s knees literally buckled when he saw it. We looked at several other houses that were in better condition (like the Sellia house) and fit most of our criteria, but this one just stuck in our heads. Well, the price of the house dropped and then dropped again – that got our attention. After many long discussions between David and I, it came down to this……David said he felt no magic with any other house we looked at, only this one. That reminded me of our first house together in League City, and the magic I felt when I first walked through it. Well, that sealed the deal. We went all in. It’s not going to be easy to make the rooms functional but we’ll do it together. That’s good enough for me.
Last week we came to the house to take some measurements. Had never seen the view at night. This video was taken at dusk. I don’t know about you, but I’m gobsmacked.
This will be the new size of the pool, which is back to it’s original size and shape. I know, not as dramatic as it once was, but we’re not always into the “cool” factor. You can see how they will make it more shallow and smaller.
You can get to our future home from two roads, which I’ll call the higher and the lower road. The higher road meanders up the hill and is overall a much safer drive. The lower road (shown right) is a straight shot up. The video doesn’t do it justice, but it was so steep, I refused to be in the car coming down so I walked while David eventually drove down slowly behind me. Stunning view.
