Mamma Mia, Here I Go Again

So it finally happened. Two weeks ago that is (still sucking at journaling, I know). I finally saw Skopelos, the island where the famous movie, Mamma Mia was filmed! I remember the first time I saw the movie in theaters; I was sixteen with my best friend and the guy I was dating at the time. Ever since, I have always had this picture-perfect image of Greece in my mind, which stayed with me when I came here as a student and later as a Fulbright grantee.
However, I never found quite an island like the island in the film and that's when my online searching began. I discovered that Mamma Mia was filmed in three locations: a place on the mainland, Skiathos, and Skopelos, where the majority of the movie was filmed. This lead to me incessantly looking for cheap ways to get to the island. From Athens, there are a few options: bus all the way up to Volvos and take a ferry from there or fly to Skiathos and ferry from Skiathos. During the midst of all this searching, Abby, another Fulbrighter from Chicago, shared with me that she had wanted to go to Skopelos but

it was a little too pricey when she originally wanted to go. Thus, we came up with the brilliant plan to go to Skopelos together.
Now that Abby was on-board, my searching became a little more direct as I looked for weekends we both had available. Abby had already missed a lot of work for other visitors so we decided it would be best to just take a weekend trip. We finally settled on flying out to Skiathos Friday night and returning Sunday night. Once in Skiathos, we would ferry to Skopelos Saturday morning and return Sunday night.
This is how our adventure began until Kathryn decided she wanted to join after hearing our plans. She has always been particular difficult to get along with and complicated our trip. We rearranged our hotel rooms, our activities, and meal choices to accommodate her. On top of this, we could no longer rent a car in advanced because she believed there would be a bus. These changes would not have been such a big issue if she was a more compassionate and empathetic person or if she had done her research a bit better. That being said, it was a fantastic trip, although I realized I cannot travel with all types of people and sometimes, I may not always get along with everyone. (Yes, these are lessons I needed and still need to learn).
Anyways, we arrived in Skiathos after flying on an itty bitty plane and our hotel owner was there to pick us up from the airport. We went back to the hotel, put our stuff down, and headed to the port to enjoy dinner. From what I was able to see, Skiathos is beautiful. It reminded me a lot of Skopelos, although more touched by tourism. Which makes sense given that they are both part of the Northern

Sporades and Skiathos has an airport and a direct ferry from Athens. I enjoyed the time I spent on Skiathos and hope to return in the future.
After dinner, we went to bed early so that we could catch the ferry out in the morning. The next morning, we headed to enjoy coffee and breakfast by the port and when our ferry arrived, we were off! It was only a 30-minute ferry ride (you can actually see Skiathos from Skopelos) so the ferry was quite small.
Upon arrival, Kathryn realized that there were no car or atv rentals nearby and the next bus arrived in two hours (no shit). We then spent a hefty amount for a taxi driver to take us from the port to Skopelos town. On the way, we stopped and saw the church, Agios Ioannis, where Momma Mia was filmed. When we first saw the church, my first thoughts were WOW, how did Amanda Seyfried run up all those stairs while singing?! As we ventured up, my attention was no longer captured by the church itself but the view from the church. The water

changed from light blue to dark blue, colors I had never seen before. The whole island was covered in trees which is so unlike any other Greek island I have been to and enchanting in its own way.
Afterwards, we headed into town, got settled at our hotel, and went out for lunch. We had some fabulous grilled octopus and ended lunch with a sweet ice cream stick on the house! We decided to walk around the town at this point but realized nothing was open and headed back to our hotel. At our hotel, I asked the owner why everything was closed at 3ish in the afternoon and she shared the stores would open up at 6pm, a authentic Greek siesta (and experience I might add!) Abby and I were tired from the day's adventures so we took a quick nap and woke up in time to go explore the shops, rent a car for the following day (since it is very hard to get anywhere on the island without one), and eat dinner by the port.
Time flew by and soon it was Sunday morning. We headed out at 9am so that we could enjoy a coffee and breakfast (yogurt and honey again for me!) by the port. I should clarify that this is a different port than the one we arrived at; we arrived at Glossa Port but this was the port in Skopelos town. After eating, we went to Kastani Beach where quite a few scenes of Momma Mia were filmed (Sophie reading Donna's diary, Tanya sings 'Does Your Mother Know', where Sophie and Sky love singing 'Lay All Your Love on Me' and where Donna and Sophie's dads say goodbye to Sophie and Sky singing 'I Have

a Dream'. We spent the rest of the day at the beach, sipping on Alphas. This is also where I crushed my finger between a pool chair and am currently missing half a fingernail. On the flip side, this beach is just as gorgeous as it was in the movie. There are trees surrounding the beach and crystal clear blue water that changes into a darker shade the further out you go. I was in awe at the untouched beauty of this island; it appeared to be a little gem hidden in the world not found yet by other tourists (although I heard since the movie, this has not been the case.)
After we left, we headed back to Glossa port, where we left the car. We toured the town of Glossa and then went to enjoy dinner in Glossa port. I fell asleep for the whole ferry ride back to Skiathos and then we walked 20 minutes from the port to the airport. We boarded another itty bitty flight back to Athens and fell asleep after our long but spectacular journey.