I’ve always pictured Athens as a godly laurel-wreathed statue, looking up onto the epic pillars of the Parthenon, bathed in Zeus’ lightning bolts that zing down from Mount Olympus. Turns out – as I learned while dragging my rolling suitcase over one too many piles of restaurant waste and cigarette butts on the crumbling sidewalk, sucking the native rotting-garbage aroma up my nostrils – Athens has gone a little downhill since earth-goddess Demeter retired as landscaper. While the modern-day Greek capital does keep up that dingy, rustic, cramped appeal, it’s not much more charming than our own friendly neighborhood slums – and those aren’t halfway around the world.

But Athens can dirty my suitcase any day, because as the gateway city to a grab bag of the most desirable islands in Europe, we are willingly at its mercy. One sweaty heatwave of a travel day in, 30 minutes of standing on the metro (newly renovated after the 2004 Olympics) and a sardine-packed harbor frenzy later, we arrive at the ferry where vessels whisk their passengers southeast to the various islands that speckle the fabled Aegean Sea: the glorious Cyclades.

Here, in the thick air of the Piraeus Port, is where the decision-making must begin – or, if you want to board any time that day, the decision should have been booked a few weeks ago. For the more parental, sophisticated sightseers among us (and these are sights worth seeing), a nine-hour ferry ride will be rewarded by the slopes of Santorini, a volcanic lagoon-ring of islands dotted with the most majestic of the Cyclades’ signature architecture – exotic pueblos white-and-blue-washed to match the crystal oceans and skies behind. Okay, so this is straight off the postcard, but what the hell – they couldn’t just make this kind of beauty up, could they?

In all, the Cyclades comprise about 220 islands, many uninhabited. (If you’re feeling restless, I can think of no better adventure than trying to reach one of the more obscure islands. But for restraints of time and imagination, I’ll stick to the more worn destinations.) Of the other most famed islands, Ios is designated as the get-your-kicks party place for the an edgy college-aged crowd; Mykonos is a more upscale summer-home metropolis with nude beaches aplenty; and Naxos is the largest island, rich in ancient ruins and natural fertility. There’s really no such thing as a bad Cyclade, so closing your eyes and letting your finger drop on the map is a perfectly legitimate trip-planning strategy.

My particular landing place of choice in July 2005 lay just to the west of Naxos, about a four-hour ferry from the port, on a surprisingly spacious boat with enough secret passageways to render me excited (that was, of course, before landing, when I discovered a whole new kind of labyrinth: fascinating homes, holes-in-the-walls and alleyways winding up into the island).

Three friends and I arrived to the spinning wings of the legendary isle windmills – framed against the pinks and oranges of a perfect Paros sunset – and a heaping platter of cheap hotels with Greek salads and the best gyros on earth. The neighboring caves, beaches and views of Antiparos (the lesser-traveled offspring of the main island) were only a short day trip off.

The nightlife in Parikia, Paros’ capital “”city”” (no larger than downtown La Jolla), is a lively kind of cozy, and the larger-scale clubs of Naoussa require only a thrilling half-hour long night ride by motorbike. Escaping the daily grind is a worldwide endeavor, and summer sees the Cyclades far more infested with European tourists than sunburned Americans, creating the “”Around the World”” party of the century.

We drank ouzos into the night at the Dubliner (yeah, pretty much every country has a Dubliner or two) with the same gang of Dutch rowdies a couple nights in a row.

Then we pulled some traditional Greek moves at the next-door old-town club Island, where the liquor flows like wine and the locals are surprisingly embracing (perhaps their friendliness is heightened if you’re a young girl willing to dance on the bar for some watered-down shots). Of course, there was that Arizonian douchebag who insisted we “”sprinkle our sexy all over the dance floor”” – but you can never truly escape America, no matter how far the ferry ride.