Today was divine. A whole day of relaxation, which was the perfect antithesis to the craziness of Rome. I got up in the morning & the lovely hostel owner made me breakfast of fresh fruit, muesli & yogurt, and I sat on the balcony eating & sipping a cup of tea while I had a chat to Mum on skype. We took our time getting ready for the day & I followed Esther down to the beach around 10:00, down many MANY stairs (trying not to think too much about how I would have to climb back up all of those stairs later on…). You slip through tiny alleyways & meander your way down between people's apartments until you finally wind up down the bottom at the pebbled beach, & there we set up camp for the next 5 hours!

Because the beach is quite pebbly & the sun is so hot, we decided to rent a deck chair each & an umbrella, so that I could actually spend some time ON the beach, rather than just hovering nearby in the shade. It was the best 10 euros I've ever spent! :) We lay on our deck chairs reading our books, listening to music, & napping for hours at a time. I bought fantastic (& fantastically cheap!) calzone & gelato from a nearby café for lunch & ate down on the beach. Feeling SO sleepy after napping for the better part of 2 hours, I forced myself to jump in the water, which was certainly refreshing. Given that the water's not that warm in Perth anyway it really wasn't THAT cold I suppose…just sort of like Cottesloe in the middle of spring.

When the wind picked up in the afternoon, we forced ourselves out of our deck chairs & hiked back up to the hostel. It's like doing Jacob's ladder about 10 times over in a row, minus the coming down part. Um…ouch! Still, it was lovely to get to the top & see Kiki & Loui greeting us by the front door, before jumping in a cool shower then retiring once again to the balcony for drinks & more chillaxing :D We had dinner in a restaurant across the road that evening & both quickly found ourselves yawning & ready for bed. Today was one of my favourite holiday days so far…a true holiday within a holiday. Completely free of pressure & time constraints, in exquisite surroundings, where you can't help but feel blissfully relaxed :)