Porto Yachts

26/12/2023

Merry Christmas to each and everyone of you, beautiful people!

We wish you to enjoy precious moments with your special people during the most festive time of year!

In Greece, there are plentiful customs and traditions around Christmas, all deeply rooted in Greek history and culture.

Christmas is linked all around the world to the ancient tradition of decorating trees with countless ornaments and beautiful lights. However, an old traditional custom on Greece’s islands and its coastal regions dictates that people should decorate a boat rather than an evergreen tree at Christmastime, called ''Karavaki'' which in Greek means small boat.

The tradition of the “Karavaki,” which is Greek for “small boat,” is deeply rooted in the folkways of a country with a symbiotic relationship to the sea.

In fact, it is safe to say that on many Greek islands, the boats decorated for Christmas still remain the most popular symbol of this beautiful holiday season.

May your hearts be filled with warmth and your smiles bright!

Love and warmest wishes,

Boat.gr Team

18/10/2023

30/06/2023

Caryatids, the "daughters of Athens» epitomized the idealized notions of harmony, balance, and nobility in Ancient Greek architecture.

They were an evolution of the earlier korai statues of both male and female figures prevalent throughout the Archaic period and used as columns in Ionian architecture. Caryatids were used in gates, facades, cornices, friezes, roofs and more.

Similarly, to Korai, these women stand tall and straight. Unlike Korai, they were created in High Classical style with a graceful contrapposto stance and detailed vertical drapery mimicking the vertical fluting of the Ionic columns.

In ancient architectural art, especially in the Ionic order, the columns were often replaced by a lustrous female figure.

The classic form of Caryatid is dressed in simple but flattering veils and sleeves. She has straight and sloping trunks, and her legs are either both closed or one of them slightly forward. The hands are to the side and down, sometimes holding a tribute in one hand.

The most famous Caryatids are the Caryatids of Erechtheion, the most sacred building on the Acropolis.

A complex marble building, it is a brilliant example of the Ionic order. The eastern part of the temple was dedicated to the worship of Athena, the patron goddess of the city, while the western part was dedicated to Poseidon-Erechtheus from whom the temple got its name.

All six of the Caryatids look very similar, but on closer inspection, one will notice that each one is unique!

Their hair is long and tied in a different manner for each elaborate hairstyle and each one was painted on the surface in a different color, which though faded in the course of time.

12/01/2023

Constantine, the former and last king of Greece, who won an Olympic gold medal before becoming entangled in his country’s volatile politics in the 1960s as king and spent decades in exile, has died at the age of 82.

He was born on 2 June 1940 in Athens to Princess Frederica of Hanover and Prince Paul, younger brother of King George II and heir presumptive to the throne. He was also a cousin of British monarch King Charles III.

The family, which had ruled in Greece from 1863 – apart from a 12-year republican interlude between 1922 and 1935 – was descended from Prince Christian, later Christian IX of Denmark.

In 1960, aged 20, he and two other Greek sailors won a gold medal in the Dragon Class – now no longer an Olympic class – at the Rome Olympics.

When he acceded to the throne as Constantine II in 1964 at the age of 23, the youthful monarch was hugely popular.

While still a prince, Constantine was elected a member of the International Olympic Committee and became an honorary member for life in 1974.

When the dictatorship collapsed in July 1974, Constantine was eager to return to Greece but was advised against it by veteran politician Constantine Karamanlis, who returned from exile to head a civilian government.

To his final days, Constantine, while accepting that Greece was now a republic, continued to style himself King of Greece even though Greece no longer recognised titles of nobility.

For most of his years in exile, he lived in London.

It took Constantine 14 years to return to his country, briefly, to bury his mother, Queen Frederica in 1981, but he eventually moved back permanently.

He is survived by his wife, the former Princess Anne-Marie of Denmark, five children, and nine
grandchildren.