LaMarche family

May 8-9, 2026

David and I got a chance to take a trip to Mykonos, Greece! One of our vendors from work gave us this trip, and we planned Calvin's graduation events around it. May 2 was his party, and May 22 is his graduation day. Our trip is May 8-18! Violet's wedding is in one short month.

We think it's super fun to go back to a tiny island in Greece - since we went to a tiny island (Skopelos!) in Greece for our honeymoon in 2003. 23 years later, we get the blessing of being back on the hilly, white-housed landscape. Not the same place, but a similar vibe.

We are staying at the Myconian Royal. This island is 10 miles x 6 miles. The roads are hair-pin turns, curves, and one-lane. Let's go through the travel getting here first. In short, we took a 2pm flight on May 8 from Waterloo to Chicago, then a 4:45pm flight from Chicago to Athens. That one was 10.5 hrs - and we did our best to sleep, but maybe for 3-4 hrs each. We landed in Athens about 11am Greece time, then caught the last flight to the island from Athens to Mykonos, and landed there around 2:30pm Sat May 9. We snagged an Uber to the hotel, which was a 20 minute adventure. We quickly learned the landscape, roads, and how to navigate traffic by that experience. One memorable event was on the long flight from Chicago to Athens there was a medical emergency on the airplane. The flight attendants called for a doctor to help - and multiple people came forward. We could not tell what was going really, but Dave was in the aisle and picked up the fact that some guy was having fainting episodes, and maybe from low blood pressure. Somebody ended up lying in the flight attendant's center aisle space where they prepare coffee, etc....and recovered. Whoever was struggling was ok, but it was a couple hours of drama.

There was concern on our first flight from Waterloo to Chicago because there was a wind delay, and we got in much later than we thought. We had 30 minutes to get from our landing point to the flight to Athens, but we got to the gate right when our group was boarding. Our hope was the suitcase we checked in Waterloo made it to Mykonos, and it did, so that was a relief.

Upon arriving at our room in Mykonos, we checked in, kinda knocked out for a nap. Our room is cozy and has a gorgeous view, with a patio and a table we can hang out and enjoy the ocean view. Greek islands are really hilly and this hotel is nestled in the hillside, spread up the hill and has multiple levels. The lobby is gorgeous, so many decorations, and our room is simple with a king bed and bathroom, but the view is incredible. I can hear the ocean. Time for photos!! This encompasses travel and our first day.

Our first view of Mycokos

Myconos airport

on the Uber ride seeing the view for the first time - the ocean is always exciting!

our first look outside our hotel room view!

everything is just so pretty - even the white walls and vegetation

first sunset - so gorgeous

pool view at the resort

the path to our room

lobby decor - not quite sure I'm looking at

dinner - we had greek salad and chicken and pork gyros

the pool is sparkly!

Sunday, May 10, 2026

Today we slept until we needed to wake up. Dave set an alarm to get up at 9am but I didn't hear it. We rolled out of bed reluctantly at 9:30am. Our goal was to get to breakfast before it closed. The buffet had amazing options - our favorite part of breakfast was the soft-boiled eggs on toast. Runny eggs...yum. Fruit, potatoes, eggs, fruit, juice, and espresso - so so satisfyingl

We rented a car and took some recommendations from the local concierge.

the breakfast view

The adventure begins - we rented a car! Time to explore the island! We stopped in Ano Mera for espresso at Villago, then we were recommended to go to Kikis - a rustic well rated restaurant with gorgeous views. We saw an iconic lighthouse (Armenistis Lighthouse), then spent the rest of the day in Myconos "downtown" shopping, cigar shopping, and and viewing the sunset. Here are some pics.

every building is white

gorgeous views

Paralia Agios Sostis beach

Kikis lunch location

view from Kikis

some delicious salads we enjoyed - lentils, broccoli, beet, and something else, forgot what it was. it had mint.

view is gorgeous

marinated chicken thighs with potato

Armenistis Lighthouse

"Sea Lavender" - these little weeds are pretty - and covered the landscape by the ligthouse

Dave tried connecting with the local goats but he was unsuccessful

what is this little stubby van

Myconos is a cruise port island

first view of the main city

the iconic windmills from the 16th century

this little strip is called "Little Venice"

Dave did some shirt shopping

sunset was a bit cloudy - but still pretty

after sunset the lights and candles came out - made this little place look so cute. It was a restaurant called Coccos.

Monday, May 11th, 2026

Beautiful views at breakfast again - we did a little shopping and I got a new pair of sunglasses while we waited for our room to be cleaned.

We are not really sure what today holds - tomorrow is the first hosted dinner so we have a lot of relaxation time.

I'm going to go ahead and call today "beach day". We just put on our lazy hats and sat on cushy chairs by the water. We did get into the freezing water once. I think we were there from 2pm to 6pm just chillin'.

We showered and got ready for dinner and took the recommendation by Zach, one of the front desk staff, to go to Alemagou - a beach club - it was an open air tucked away oasis that was delightful. It had a very cool vibe and I was given a blanket when I started feeling cold. We shared a burrata, cheese, olive and sourdough appetizer, shared steak slices, salad, and some traditional orange greek cake/pie and some profiteroles.

Traditional Greek orange pie and Profiterols

Tuesday, May 12, 2026

For some odd reason my photos are not loading from May 12, so I can't post any. Dave and I woke up and had a mostly lazy morning, enjoyed breakfast, then we settled at a table by the pool to work on payroll, which took a few hours. We were looking forward to the dinner event put on by Springs that evening at the restaurant. We didn't venture out at all, we stayed around the resort. We got all dressed up and had another delicious dinner (food here is so good) - the party got started by a band playing local music with some dancers getting the group going in fun lines - smashing ceramic plates - it got kinda wild.

We ended the night talking to quite a few people - the VP of Home Franchise Concepts (Corey) and President of Budget Blinds (Heather) with lots of other owners.

Wednesday, May 13, 2026

Today was another exploring day! We took the car out to some recommendations by our favorite front desk staffer Zach. He gave us three places to check out and they were gorgeous and delicious. First stop - Fokos beach, then another one I forgot the name of, then to Lia Tavern for lunch. The roads are just adventurous and fun - not much traffic now for this time of the year - we hear they're gearing up for busy season, and this is just the tale end of slow season. Dave said "These roads were built for optimism!" because you never knew if there was a car coming the opposite direction on the one-lane rock-walled-in roads.

this is our rental car

can you see the steep road we're on? It's going 45 degrees down!

this guy greeted us on the side of the road

Fokos beach

near this was another field of "sea lavendar"

there were some seriously amazing skippers

this goofy van belonged to a funny women building her own little fort out of natural things by the beach. It says "I can go slower"

the second beach - just as pretty

colorful granite

my bouquet of weeds

Our next stop was to venture into a national forest - which really was not much to see - the ocean views were incredible, but the roads kept getting worse and felt more like ATV roads, not car roads. We found the restaurant that Zach had recommended and it was 20 out of 10. Like...every sense was activated. The weather was perfect, the sparkling water with lemon was refreshing, greek salad just perfect with the chunks of feta, cucumbers, tomatoes, pepper, red onion and olive oil/vinegar mix, fried haloumi cheese, chicken souvlaki with potatoes and onions, bread with tomato paste and kalamata olives. Dave is starting to like olives, so that was fun to see him enjoying him.

We were quite hungry (2-3pm) so it hit perfectly. The place was just adorable, white everything, plants everywhere, a new beach in view, really nice staff...here's some pics.

We came back to our room to chill a bit and relax. Next up was an invite-only dinner at 7:30 (I know, more food?) with our Springs rep Julie Arford and three other owners. We were transported by van to the main Mykonos town and ate at M'eatings - another fun dining experience! We sat with Shannon and Julie (both Springs reps), Karen and Matt from Florida, Jeff and Andrea from Wisconsin, and Charles and Diana from Missouri.

We had a lot of fun with them - kind of a silly group.