Ouzo - Taverna Galini

Η Astypalea (Astypalia) The most northwestern island of the Dodecanese with a population of about a thousand inhabitants is located in the middle of the Aegean Sea, 25 nautical miles from the two Cycladic islands of Amorgos and Anafi and Kos. It has the shape of a butterfly and is divided into two: Inside and Outside the Island with a small isthmus of not even a hundred meters.

If in Mesa Nissi and especially in the farthest point in relation to the capital of the island is the famous Linda tavern on Exo Island northeast at the same distance is located at Deep the lesser known "Ouzo - Taverna Galini".

Vathi is one of the communities of Astypalea, the smallest and most remote, but with a lot of people in the past. It looks like a lagoon, due to the very closed entrance of the bay (about 50 m.) Which restricts the entrance to the sea. It is 21 km NE of Chora. Until the 1960s, there were lime kilns and an elementary school. Today 3-4 families live in Vathi and one of them is of Stavroula Marinaki.

Vathi is located on the road after Maltezana and on the trip one encounters wild landscapes and a completely different relief compared to the rest of the island. The road is a paved dirt road which in some places becomes not easily passable and gravelly. After a journey of about half an hour you reach your destination.

The visitor who will dare to walk to Vathi will be compensated by meeting perhaps the best hangman on the island. On the waterfront there is a lonely building, the Galini tavern. Its name is obviously taken from the emotion that the landscape evokes in you. A fairytale building painted in indigo and white with a covered elongated terrace facing the blue of the always calm lagoon. Some pots with basil and flowers break the absolute feeling of the rest of the stony landscape.

Η Mrs. Stavroula with a mansion person, she fights alone to bring them for a walk and the Lefteris, a fisherman from Kalymnos supplies her daily with fresh fish. Her specialty is cuttlefish with ink and octopus stew. The rhythms are slow, maybe so is the service, when it is very crowded in August.

But for those who join the atmosphere of this peaceful paradise, all they will care about is speed.