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Click on the map to see a larger version. Dreamtime was based in Marmaris on the coast of Turkey from 2000 to 2004,but since October 2005 has been based in Corfu. Corfu is a sickle shaped island lying just off the mainland of Greece and Albania in the Ionian Sea, 100 kms from the heel of Italy across the Otranto Straits. It is the most northern of the seven Ionian islands and the best known. Homer described it as "a beautiful and rich land" and Odysseus made it the last stop on his journey home to Ithaca. With it's beguiling landscape of vibrant wild flowers and slender cypress trees rising out of olive groves, Corfu is considered by many as one of Greece's most beautiful islands. This is not the Greece of the popular travel brochures picturing sun-baked rocky isles with dazzling whitewashed houses, but a green country with red tiled houses - an eccentric collection of Italian, French and English architecture. Corfu has the highest population of the Ionian Islands, and its economy is essentially driven by tourism. The island capital, Corfu Town, is a beautiful and elegant place with much of its old Venetian town remaining alive and intact, wedged between two imposing fortresses. Rows of arcaded buildings built during the French occupation, model as upmarket restaurants, side by side with Georgian mansions and Byzantine churches. Narrow alleyways of 18th century shuttered tenements, painted in muted tones of ochres and pinks are more reminiscent of Italy than Greece. Corfu is serviced by a large airport which is one of the busiest outside Athens with scheduled flights to all parts of Europe and internal flight to Athens. Nearly all ferries and hydrofoils running between Patras and Italy stop in Corfu so travellers can easily reach Patras on the mainland or across the Adriatic to Brindisi on the Ancona in Italy. Hourly car ferries run to and from Igoumenitsa in the high season. The Ionian islands are a favourite with Greek sailors for their green luxuriance, the multitude of small anchorages they offer, and their easy sailing conditions where in summer the wind rarely blows above 5 knots.