It is a relatively short distance from Kavala to Lemnos and despite only leaving at 10:00pm last night, there was plenty of time for us to sail to Lemnos. We arrived there early in the morning and dropped anchor close to the small port of Myrina.

The port of Myrina is small and can't accept a ship the size of ours, so disembarkation today was going to be done using the ship's tenders. This can be quite an adventure in itself, especially when the sea is a bit rough, but today the sea was very calm.

It was 9.00 AM and we had to be back here at 1.30 PM to catch the last tender. It seemed like plenty of time to take in the sights and perhaps have a light lunch ashore.

According to the above, we should have been able to see Mount Athos from the island, so I checked the map to see which direction we should be looking in and decided to keep an eye out for it during our sightseeing walk.

A stall had been set up by friendly students from a local agricultural college (we think) to promote the island's produce. We were invited to sample their goods, which looked delicious, but there was nothing for sale... and what a pity we had just eaten breakfast!

The views from the top were stunning.

These photos were taken from a distance. Geoff didn't fancy walking along the precipitous narrow path to get here!

It was time to decide whether we wanted to return to the ship for lunch or stay ashore for as long as possible and have a bite to eat. We chose the latter and were very pleased that we had done so, because we had an excellent lunch.

We were the only customers and it was clear that we would be the only customers that day. The person who ran the restaurant was a lovely Australian-Greek lady (from Melbourne). She seemed quite surprised that even we had decided to eat there. She told us that despite the gorgeous weather, it was now well past the end of the season. The last charter flights had left and the islanders were bracing themselves for the long, quiet winter ahead. Nevertheless, we were made to feel very welcome and we simply asked her to serve us what she had available and could recommend. We weren't disappointed with the result. It was all delicious.

She seemed a little panicked when we asked about desserts, but soon came back with these preserved cherries. They were excellent!

After lunch, we still had about fifteen minutes before the last tender, so we continued strolling. We were very aware that this was the last full day of our holiday. In the golden warmth of the late summer sunshine, we couldn't think of a better setting or a more perfect day to end it on.

We had only seen a tiny part of this lovely island (see below). Reading about it afterwards, we realised how much more it has to offer. Click here to see its Wikipedia entry.

At 1:30pm, we caught the last tender back to the ship. We were two of about eight fare-paying passengers. The remainder were members of the crew, who had been running the tender operation. As an indication of how well the ship is managed, the man operating the tender knew exactly who the last remaining passengers were and ticked us all off his list before departing.

Shortly after reboarding the ship, the last tender was hoisted up, the anchor was lifted and we sailed.