The Greek island of Ikaria is in the East Aegean Sea, not far from Turkey. It’s named after Icarus, who along with his crazy brilliant inventor father, Daedelus, was imprisioned in King Minos‘ labyrinth. Daedelus fashioned two pairs of wings out of wax and feathers so that he and his son could fly out of the labyrinth and escape to safety. Daedelus warned his son to stay on the straight and narrow, else the wings might not hold. But Icarus flitted about the sky in a state of estatic reverie, got too close to the sun and *oops* his wings melted off. So, while Daedelus made it all the way to Sicily on his wings, Icarus fell into the sea right near the island now named after him, Ikaria.

I’ll be headed to Ikaria in September and hope to fare much better than poor Icarus. The island is home to the Ikarian Centre, a small school for people who would like to learn Greek. I’ll spend four weeks at the school and then another five weeks travelling about Greece with my new language skills. I may hit Turkey as well, but the details of the second half of my trip will remain hazy until I actually get to Greece.

Got suggestions for places to hit or avoid? Serve ‘em up!