UKC

hi, arriving Kos late on sat 19 april, planning to get to over kalymnos on easter sunday but struggling to get any info on ferry timetables for that day. anyone know if ferries will run on easter sunday?
thanks for any help

In reply to woppo:

Bump

In reply to woppo:

Greece, and therefore Kalymnos, has a different date for Easter, and therefore "our" Easter will have no effect on the timetables. We were there over Easter last year and and confirm that there was no effect. The Orthodox Easter was nearly a month later, not sure when it is this year. I had the impression that the climbing tourism was so useful to them that most things would run anyway.

In reply to woppo:
Orthodox Easter is on 20th of April. Currently the story is that the last ferry service has to wait for all passengers with Kalymnos as a last destination .
You could phone them on 00302243029612 to let them know you re on the flight , or try emailing them on info@anekkalymnou.gr. If you do not get anywhere this way let me know on matiamallia@hotmail.com. I am on the island and I could maybe do something for you.

In reply to woppo:

thanks for the info and offer of help.
we land at 20.10, i believe the last ferry is 22:00 so things might be tight (out airport by 21:00? then get to ferry

In reply to matiamallia:

OK, sorry for the misinformation, I never understand fully how the two Easters move in the calendar! Looks like they coincide this year!

In reply to woppo:

Currently the last ferry is at 21:00. Not sure if there is a later one over Easter. We were on the Stansted Kos flight on Tuesday just gone, we landed 15 mins early (20:55) and were in Masticahri by 21:10 (hand luggage only and a five minute taxi ride). If your plane is on time you should make it.



Chris

In reply to pog100:

I do not understand either. Some years they are running on the same dates and some years not !

In reply to woppo:

If there is a ferry running at 22.00 you should be fine. If you find long queues for passport check and taxis just tell somebody with a uniform that you have to catch the kalymnos ferry and jump the queue. unless the airport is very busy you should be out in max 20 minutes and the taxi ride to mastihari port is no more than 10 minutes plus the taxi driver can notify the ferry people to wait for you if you are marginal . If I were you I would contact the company though because you re coming on a bit special day for the locals and the services might not run properly.

In reply to woppo:

on the timetable i have seen the midweek last ferry is 9pm but every saturday it changes to 10pm - i will ring them and hopefully get easter sailings clarified.
thanks again.

In reply to matiamallia:

The normal (Gregorian) calender we use was adjusted from the old Julian one as it didn´t take into account innacuracies in the length of the year which had lead to considerable date creep regarding when the equinox was which is the basis for calculating Easter. The Orthodox church still use the older calender even though the Greek state use the newer one (it´s only been in use for about 600 years now). Easter is the first Sunday after the full moon following the equinox.

In reply to jimtitt:

Thank you Jimtitt!, very informative .

In reply to matiamallia:

I could have explained it better though. The Julian calender had the equinox on 21st March when it was established in ca 400AD and with a bit of date creep their Easter falls between 4th April and 8th May using our calender. The Gregorian calender was adjusted to make the day of the equinox always the 21st of march (or near enough) and so our Easter is between 22nd March and 25th April.
Christmas is more confused, some orthodox churches used the Revised Julian calender for fixed festivals (but not movable ones like Easter)so for the Greek´s it is on the 25th Dec like ours, others such as the Russians have it in January.

In reply to jimtitt:

Indeed Jimtitt , some Christians still refuse to follow even the revised version of the Julian calender! Lets hope the ferry timetables are a bit less confusing!thank you again.

In reply to woppo:

Hi Woppo,

The ferry timetables (and buses) are really chaotic in Kalymnos and subject to frequent impulsive changes, so hardly worth the paper they are printed on. (Yesterday the bus driver to the airport told us that he just wasn't driving there anymore because he was annoyed with the bus company about something!!) That's just Greece, I'm afraid.

However, one thing I can tell you is that the ferries are well aware of when flights come in and will wait for the flights, otherwise they leave empty, so it is in their interests. Especially the last one of the day. So I really wouldn't panic about that at all. I'm 95% sure they will wait for you.

The only tricky thing is that Easter is a big holiday for them, so a lot of things do close. So if you wanted to be 100% sure, I would recommend contacting Nikolas Papanikolas at the Philoxenia Hotel and asking him for the latest information just before you go.

He has his finger on the pulse of all things Kalymnian and has perfect English, so if there is any last-minute local disputes he will know about them.

His email address is: info@philoxenia-kalymnos.com
Tel: +30 22430 59310

Enjoy your time!!!

Serena.

In reply to Serena Lambre:

Thanks, much appreciated . First time so looking forward to it immensely.
Pretty chilled out about it, even if we spend a day on Kos which will be ok.