Zakynthos Surprised Me

I arrived in Zakynthos expecting a beautiful Greek island.

Blue sea. White cliffs. Small tavernas. Beaches. Perhaps a turtle or two.

What I didn’t expect was how quickly the island would start to feel familiar.

It began almost as soon as we landed.

We had arranged our transfer from the airport, but when it came to paying, the price was suddenly different from what we had agreed. Not exactly the welcome I had imagined.

So we decided that, for the rest of our stay, we would rather have our own wheels and our own freedom.

We wanted to see the island, not simply stay on one beach.

And that turned out to be one of the best decisions of the trip.

Somehow, you always manage to communicate

One of the first things that surprised me was how easy it was to communicate.

I remember walking into a tiny little shop and seeing an elderly woman behind the counter. I honestly wasn’t sure how we were going to manage with English.

We managed perfectly.

She spoke English, we spoke English, and somehow everything was completely natural.

It made me smile because Zakynthos has an interesting connection with Britain. The island was under British protection as part of the United States of the Ionian Islands from 1815 until 1864, when the Ionian Islands became part of Greece.

Of course, I wouldn’t claim that this is the reason everyone speaks English today. Zakynthos is a very international tourist destination, and English is simply part of everyday communication in many places.

But still, there was something rather amusing about arriving on a Greek island and finding that English felt so completely at home.

Perhaps that was one of the first little surprises Zakynthos had waiting for me.

The people started to feel familiar

We arrived in the second week of July.

It was already the main summer season, yet our experience wasn’t one of constant crowds. In the evenings, we could walk along the waterfront quite comfortably, and after a few days something rather lovely happened.

We started seeing the same people.

The same sellers.

The same faces.

A smile here, a few words there.

The island slowly became less anonymous.

Our hostess, Katerina, was incredibly kind and always happy to suggest places worth seeing. And then something happened that I certainly hadn’t expected.

One of the locals lent us his own car.

Just like that.

It was such a simple gesture, but somehow it stayed with me.

Because when you travel, you remember the big sights, of course. But sometimes it is a small act of kindness from someone you have only just met that becomes part of the story you take home.

A dessert with a view

One of Katerina’s suggestions was the Windmill.

We went there and ordered a local dessert called frygania.

It was delicious.

But what I remember most clearly isn’t the dessert.

It’s the view.

For a moment, there was nowhere else I wanted to be.

From the terrace, we looked out over the surrounding countryside, with olive trees growing all around us and nothing but the endless sea on the horizon beyond them.

Olive trees are everywhere on Zakynthos, and the island produces wonderful olive oil. We couldn’t leave without bringing some home as a souvenir — a little taste of Zakynthos that we can still enjoy long after the holiday is over.

And perhaps that’s one of the nicest souvenirs you can bring back from the island.

That is one of my favourite things about travelling.

Sometimes you don’t need a famous landmark.

You just need a table, something good to eat and a beautiful view.

Seeing Zakynthos from the sea

Of course, we also went out by boat.

And from the sea, Zakynthos looked completely different.

The cliffs seemed higher. The caves appeared where we couldn’t see them from land. Small islands and hidden corners suddenly became part of the landscape.

It was as if we were seeing the island for the first time.

And then we saw a loggerhead turtle.

A Caretta caretta.

It was swimming beside the boat, and for a few seconds everyone simply watched.

Then someone spotted it.

“There’s a turtle!”

And suddenly…

everyone was there.

Boat after boat.

It was almost funny.

We had come to see the turtles, but when you see all the boats gathering around one, you can’t help wondering how the turtle feels about having so many visitors.

It was a beautiful moment, but also a slightly uncomfortable one.

Perhaps that is the strange side of travelling to places where nature itself is the attraction.

You come because you want to see it.

And then you realise that sometimes the best thing you can do is give it some space.

Gerakas belongs to the turtles

We saw another side of Zakynthos at Gerakas Beach.

It is a beautiful, long sandy beach, but it is also an important nesting area for loggerhead turtles.

There were marked nesting sites on the sand, reminding us that this wasn’t simply a beach for tourists.

There were rules.

The beach is closed after sunset to protect the turtles and their nesting area.

And somehow, I liked that.

For once, we were the visitors.

The beach wasn’t there entirely for us.

Navagio from above

Of course, we couldn’t leave Zakynthos without seeing Navagio.

The famous shipwreck.

The beach that has appeared in so many photographs that you almost feel as if you have already been there before you arrive.

But seeing it in real life was different.

We stood high above the bay, waiting in line for hours among crowds of tourists, just for a brief moment at the viewpoint. Finally, we looked down at the famous wreck, surrounded by white cliffs and impossibly blue water.

The view was wonderful.

But the experience itself was a disappointment.

After waiting for so long and sharing the viewpoint with so many other visitors, there was hardly enough time to simply stop and take it all in.

The beach itself has been closed because of the risk of rockfalls and unstable cliffs, so this wasn’t the Navagio experience I had imagined from all those photographs.

And perhaps that was exactly why it felt so memorable.

It wasn’t about getting down to the sand.

It was about standing there, looking at something that had become almost unreal through thousands of photographs — and discovering that even the most famous places don’t always feel the way we expect them to.

What I brought home from Zakynthos

We travelled mainly around the southern and western parts of the island.

We saw the famous places.

We went out to sea.

We searched for turtles.

We stood above Navagio.

We ate local dessert with a view.

But when I think about Zakynthos now, those aren’t the only things I remember.

I remember the elderly woman in the little shop who spoke English.

I remember seeing the same people along the waterfront every day.

I remember Katerina giving us another suggestion for somewhere to go.

I remember a turtle swimming beside our boat.

And I remember a local person trusting us enough to lend us his own car.

Maybe that is why Zakynthos surprised me.

Not because it had beautiful beaches or spectacular cliffs. I expected those.

It surprised me because, somewhere between the sea, the roads, the little shops and the people we kept meeting, the island began to feel strangely familiar.

And those are usually the places I remember longest.