And You Will Go To Mykonos

I'm back in 1973. On a ferry crossing the Aegean. Two Irish girls have become my travelling companions. We are passing the uninhabited island of Delos, heading for the windmills of Mykonos.

In the early '70s, Mykonos, together with Crete, were the end-of-the-line destinations for the grand tourers. The island attracted hippies, gays, nudists, artists, Australians, and some who were all of these things. It also attracted some regular tourists as well as boat loads of American day visitors, eagerly snapping photos as they landed; the trophy shot was one with the pelican who lived in a bar on the harbour front.

Mykonos was both Bohemian and hedonistic in a style far removed from the later lager tourist who was to lay waste to Greek islands such as Zante. It was distant enough from the mainland to have a streak of independence. Locals would speak to you, albeit in hushed tones, about the brutality of the country's military regime.

Despite the poor image that followed the 1967 coup, Mykonos and the Greek islands gradually became a new, but still unspoiled world for the tourist. Like Spain under Franco, there was a questionableness as to the morality of tourism; not that this deterred the hippies or the intellectuals who would gather at the tavernas in Mykonos town every evening.

And like Franco's Spain, and therefore Mallorca, Greece looked for economic salvation from tourism, which it got, along with a construction and inward investment boom.

For the teenaged grand tourer, the contrary liberal attitudes of Mykonos were only one part of the Greece story. You didn't go to Greece without doing the culture as well. The Irish girls and I sat under a tree and ate watermelon, shaded from the ferocity of a July heat traipsing around the Acropolis. For those who ventured to Crete, the hippy enclaves of Plakias and elsewhere were the base camps for visiting the cradle of Minoan civilisation.

Come forward to today, and Greece and the Greek islands have a new poor image - twice over. Greece is Euroland's basket case; there is no more construction, and the economy has all but collapsed. The islands have attained a reputation tarnished by the movement across the Mediterranean of a particular type of holidaymaker. For all this though, like Mallorca, the islands are anticipating a boom summer, the beneficiaries of the north African upheavals. While all else in the economy may be failing, tourism is being seen, once more, as the salvation.

Helena Smith, writing in "The Guardian", stirred the memories of Mykonos. She also described a situation with similarities to Mallorca.

The Greek prime minister sees tourism as the "model for economic development", but the country and its islands need re-branding, says the president of the Association of Greek Tourism Enterprises. "The immense cultural wealth" has to be tapped into. Yet, this wealth, says the prime minister, is something "we either don't know or have no idea about promoting in a proper and organised way".

It is the coinciding of re-branding and culture that has resonance for Mallorca. The development of cultural tourism, long wished for, has been dashed on the rocks of a lamentable inability to conceive a brand image that isn't dominated by sun and beach. Partly this is because Mallorca, much though some in positions who should know better might believe, doesn't have strong culture. Certainly not in the way that Greece does. And if the Greeks can't promote culture, then frankly what the hell hope is there for Mallorca?

It seems crazy that the Greeks, with that immense cultural wealth, should need to think about its branding. It should sell itself. As it used to. In 1973, though I might also have had more basic pleasures in mind, it never occurred to me not to do the culture. It was one of the reasons why you went. And nowadays, you can even get guided tours of the archaeologically and mythologically important Delos, which was off-limits back then.

Perhaps it is something in the nature of today's tourism and tourists from the old world of Britain and northern Europe. Destinations, be they Mallorca or Mykonos, overtaken by development, have bred the contempt of familiarity and convenience. What once was a curiosity, a leap into the unknown, an adventure has gone. And it has taken with it any natural and unforced enquiry and interest in culture. You can promote it, but does anyone listen?


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.