Traveling with Bart and Ann is effortless fun. Here we are making the best of a day of unpredictable weather.

After our stop in Heraklion we met up with Bart and Ann again and travelled east to a fairly low-key resort town called Elounda. The town was okay, but the surrounding area was really beautiful. The Spinalonga peninsula juts out from the mainland near here, forming a gorgeous bay. Beyond the peninsula, Crete’s eastern mountains loom, so that views in every direction feature bands of various shades of blue. The bay is dotted with beaches in various directions, so you are never too far from a good swim.

Coffee time

High atop Spinalonga island

Two things did go wrong with our visit here. First was the weather. This is my fifth visit to Greece, and I’ve rarely ever encountered anything other than hot, dry weather. It almost never occurred to me that anything else existed here. And September is supposed to be an ideal time to visit. But we just had a few days of moody, rainy, grey weather, with an occasional respite of sunshine.

The second problem is that we rented an apartment on AirBNB that turned out to be a loser — one of those that looks much better in the pictures than in real life. Jim and I generally avoid AirBNB because of the wild unpredictability of what you get. But Bart and Ann are bigger fans, and it can be fun sharing a house with friends. But this place just felt crappy. Two of the three bedrooms were on an entirely subterranean floor, with the only light coming from the below-ground portion of a light well. These rooms were dark and depressing. Furnishings and towels and bed linens felt like cheap hand-me-downs from someplace else.

But none of this could stop the four of us from having a great time. We beat the weather by playing lots of cards. We survived the poor-value apartment by making lots of jokes. And when the weather took a surprise turn for the better we reveled in the sunshine on a wonderful beach. And of course we talked politics incessantly, as we are wont to do with these two.

And last, but not least, we also visited a leper colony. Spinalonga island is not just any leper colony. It’s an island dramatically situated in the bay with ruins of a 16th century Venetian fortress, later Turkish reinforcements, and the town that served as many as 1,000 resident lepers in the early to mid-20th century. Best leper colony we’ve ever been to.

A beach taverna in gloomy weather still has a certain charm, as taken in by a pensive Ann

Frolicking on the beach under moody weather

The pool and terrace were the nice part of our house, especially on the morning when the when the weather started to turn our way. The photos on the AirBNB site were all taken from masterly angles so that you had no idea these ugly electric wires were there.

Once the weather turned nice we settled on this amazing beach. That’s Spinalonga island, the former leper colony, on the right.

Approaching Spinalonga island on a ferry

Climbing among the fortifications on Spinalonga island

Jim reaches the summit of the island

One of the dramatic entrances to the leper colony

Jim poses with his namesake in a chapel to St. George on Spinalonga island

Having great Cretan food with Athena and Ann

When we were visiting Boston last spring we pleaded with our old neighbors Bart and Ann to meet us in Greece this fall. They were interested but non-committal at the time. Some time later their friends from California, Ken and Athena, also prodded them to come to Greece. So they gave in and set plans in motion. The result is that we all just flew into Chania, Crete and took up residence in a lovely apartment overlooking the harbor for a few days.

Elegant Venetian-era doorways in our neighborhood. This one features Roman script above the door.

It was not just any old apartment, but part of a lovingly restored “palazzo” built on top of Chania’s Byzantine walls during the Venetian rule of Crete somewhere in the 13th to 17th centuries. The building served as the residence of the Venetian rulers until Chania fell to the Turks in 1645, when it became the residence of the Turkish Pasha. The house survived heavy bombing in World War II and was eventually restored by an American painter named Dorothy Andrews. Today it is an elegant monument to all of those eras. Our apartment’s stately rooms and huge rooftop terrace offered sweeping views of the Chania harbor.

It was a wonderful place to reconnect with Ann and Bart — and to get to know their friends Ken and Athena. We also got lots of special insight into Greek food, language, and culture from Athena, who is a native of Greece and a very fun-loving person. (You might guess that Athena Georgakopoulos is Greek, no?) So we had a wonderful few days of socializing, playing cards, sitting on the beach, sipping wine, and exploring Cretan cuisine.

From here Jim and I will stop in the Cretan capital of Heraklion for a few days before rejoining Bart and Ann in the eastern part of the island.

The view of the harbor from our rooftop terrace, with an Ottoman-era mosque in the foreground

We had the top floor and the roof terrace of this magnificent old Venetian palazzo built on top of the Byzantine walls

The harbor was magnificent at sunset

Like Cyprus, Crete has lots of friendly cats everywhere, including this doorway a few houses down from our apartment

Jim in front of one of the entrances to our building

Bart, Jim, Athena, Ken, and Ann strolling through Chania after dinner

Me checking out the sunset from the terrace

We spent two days chilling out on this beach just a 20-minute walk from our apartment

That’s me and Athena out on the terrace