My interest in human monsters is, of course, academic. I am not a vampire - the one Polish dish I don't like is blood soup, and I love garlic. So what has this all got to do with Greece?

I remember sitting in a bar somewhere on Santorini off -season, and the bartender, who obviously had an interest in scaring tourists - or intriguing them- told me about the Great Santorini Vampire Tradition. Apparently, numerous cases of vampirism and vampires have been reported throughout Santorini's volcanic history, and the islet of Thirasia, opposite Santorini is supposed to house many of them, as they were frequently buried here. Now that I'm planning to include Werewolves in my novel, I've suddenly started to take an interest. If I had been less distracted at the time by other concerns, I would have asked a fisherman to take me to Thirasia by caique to check out the traces, so to speak.
Vampirism/ werewolfdom/blood-lust is, of course, nothing new. The Ancient Greeks had a myth about Lycaon, a King of Arcadia, who as a test (and a gruesome joke) fed human flesh to Zeus, the king of the gods, at a banquet. Zeus saw through the ruse, and in a fury turned Lycaon into a wolf.
When Bram Stoker wrote Dracula, he was inspired by the legends of vampirism and werewolves in Central and Eastern Europe, not least Count Vlad the Impaler, about whom several people on BNA have already written.
I visited Dracula's castle way back in 1971 with my family when we were living in Romania. Outside it looked impressive, but I must say, in spite of all the political undertones (Ceausescu was frequently compared to Count Vlad), the castle was a big disappointment once you got in. Forget it if you were expecting huge, draughty, cobwebby dining rooms and creaking wide staircases with 'cold spots'. The rooms were small and poky.
Anyway Count Vlad had another castle which is much less frequently visited than Bran, and this is because it's a ruin, on top of a very high rock. The view from there is awesome, and you can imagine much better how the bloody Count impaled Turks there.
I could tell numerous stories about spooky goings-on in Romania, but I think shall leave it for the moment and return closer to Greece, this time to Sicily.
When I was living in Sicily, one of the most desirable places to visit was Cefalu. This pretty arabesque town on the sea boasts a magnificent cathedral as well as windy streets with steps cascading down. Surprisingly for such a religious place in the 1930's, the Black Magician Aleister Crowley spent a couple of years just outside Cefalu in a farmhouse that he converted into an "Abbey'. He was made to leave Sicily by the authorities, and anyway he was ill. The locals presumably had had enough of his salacious ways - he and his mistresses shocked the then feudal Sicilians by swimming naked, and anyway who knows what the God-fearing locals thought of having a foreign Black Magician in their midst.
I have never lived in Slovakia, and only visited Bratislava once, but once again, here was a missed opportunity. Maybe I shall make it up in the future. The Blood Countess Elizabeth Bathory lived in a castle in Cachtice - not far from Trencin, like Cefalu, a lovely town - where, legend/ truth (according to your point of view) has it, she abducted local village virgins, tortured them and then killed them, and bathed in their blood because she thought that would keep her young and beautiful. She features in Sabine Baring Gould's 'The Book of Werewolves', a must read for anyone interested in the psychology of werewolves/vampires.
Which brings me back to Greece for now. It's no surprise to me that Greece has a vampire tradition, when you consider how old the legends of werewolves and vampires go back. Andros, as far as I know, doesn't have one, but Santorini isn't a million miles from Andros. I would have thought that Northern Greece, with all its forests, and actual wolves until quite recently - the few that are left are protected - would have a strong werewolf tradition, but I haven't found out anything yet about it. A project for the future.