September is Arthritis Awareness Month! It's a disease that affects 1 in 5 people in Canada.  That's more people than diabetes, heart disease, cancer and stroke combined.  Arthritis can look like anyone - a child, a teenager, your mom, your friends and myself. This month my blog is focusing on amber, arthritis and a new collection.

There are so many islands in Greece, it's hard to choose which ones to visit. Santorini and Mykonos are definitely two of the more popular ones.  But be prepared in the summer they are quite busy.

Greece begins it's tourism season on Greek Orthodox Easter weekend until October 31st of each year. In 2020, my family and I had booked a trip to Crete along with a small island called Naxos but it had to be cancelled. You know why!!

It took us 3 years to take this trip but in July we flew to Crete to spend 8 days there. It is the largest of the Greek islands and one trip cannot cover even a fraction of it. It takes almost 4 half hours just to drive from the east side of the island to the west.  Renting a car is a must if you plan to explore and try to get the smallest one you can. The roads are narrow especially in the small villages. One thing we learned when driving is when someone wants to pass you, be courteous and move to the right edge of the road so they can.

We decided to stay in eastern Crete near a small village called Plaka. I did very little research when planning this trip but I must say the eastern side was a great choice.

Eastern Crete is much less developed than the western side. It is more rugged with small villages interspersed throughout the mountains. The western side of Crete is more touristy and I think it's because they have the best sandy beaches there. They also have the Samariá Gorge which is a major tourist attraction. We spent most of our time along the eastern coast with a couple trips into the capital city of Heraklion.