Eleni N. Gage

This is the second "Secret Hotels" story I've done for Budget Travel (the first was on Paros and Antiparos, see Selected Works at right) and I love researching them because you meet such interesting people while seeking out these small, idiosyncratic inns. My favorite moment on this trip was when I ordered a frappe at a kafenion overlooking a mountainside filled with purple morning glories in a small village in Cephallonia and the waiter recognized me from the cover of North of Ithaka. He was a British folklorist who married a local woman he had once tutored in English, and he had reviewed the book for a folklore journal. Folklorists--we're lurking everywhere. At least everywhere there are old men on donkeys who trot by while you're drinking your morning frappe....

To read the story, click on the link at left. The top link will take you to a PDF file of the story, the bottom link directly to the text on Budget Travel's website.