Mid to End November – Meteora to Alendroupolis

Our first night in Meteora was in the 3 star Lonely Planet recommended place. We had thought we’d only be there one night and we can’t justify camping for one night when it takes over an hour to set up camp and about 2 hours to break it. It was a nice place, friendly hosts, but not incredible value for money. Anyway, it had an en suite bathroom and that is something not to be sniffed at on this trip. Two major things happened that night – 1. We heard that Tara and Dave were coming to join us there the next day, hurrah, an unexpected chance to meet up with new friends. 2. I discovered that the kids had lice. Time stops, mind freezes, mental panic. MY KIDS??? Lice????? That evening dragged into an eternity as i waited for the next morning and for a pharmacy to open. Pieter was immediately sent off to purchase anything and everything the pharmacist recommended while i fed the kids. He returned and everyone was lotioned and potioned and showered to within an inch of their lives. I then felt we needed to return to said pharmacy to purchase more of this stuff to go through the same procedure a few days later and be sure the blighters were dead. Pharmacist found my over reaction hysterically funny and said that we should think of our new friends as a little “souvenir from Greece”. Strangely i had sense of humour failure at this point. I felt sure that our new visitors were due to Euan’s cuddling of every stray, however the pharmacist declared this was definitely not the case and they would have come from other children – Greek children. “There is nothing strange in this” she claimed, “all Greek children have lice at this time of year”. My mind jumped back to our 2 separate nights in the one bedroom apartment in Athens with Ioannis and family.....ick ick ick.
So crisis averted (or overcome) we made our way to the campsite in Meteora to set up camp and wait for Tara and Dave. Sadly what was to come became our only bad experience of Greek people to date. The woman at the campsite was a horror who took pleasure in screaming at our children, frightening them half to death, blaming them for the shit that was floating in their dirty toilets, for things that were broken in the toilet block, for playing on their bikes, etc. All three kids had nightmares due to this woman and if it hadn’t been for the great company of Tara and Dave we would have left after one night. Exploring Meteora was amazing, check out this link for some amazing pictures meteora. Little monasteries and nunneries perch on the top of these weird rock formations and we visited 2 and around the mountain passes to see the others. We had great evenings, drinking too much wine, eating great meals that Dave prepared for us, chatting and appreciating the company.
From Meteora and our farewell to Gerty the motor home and her inhabitants, we drove as much as we could in one day and got to Kavala on the North Eastern coast by nightfall. We popped our heads in on a 4 star hotel to get a quote and fell over backwards to discover that B&B in a 4 star hotel was going to be cheaper than any of the other 3 nights we have had in paid hotel-type accommodation where we have had barrack style beds, plastic furniture etc. Well, that’s us got another new rule for the trip – when we need accommodation we’ll get a quote from a 4 star place first!! It was a lovely room, LOVELY bathroom with huge shower and plenty of space for me to set about attacking the kids with the pharmaceutical concoctions for killing unwanted guests (which were probably long dead but i am paranoid). A lovely breakfast the next with an amazing view and we left to drive on feeling rested and clean and pampered. Ahhhh, there is nothing like a splash of luxury after weeks in a tent. So we drove on to Alexandroupolis, the town nearest the border with Turkey and where we knew there was another campsite open. And this is where i type from – a gigantic campsite where we, once again, are the only visitors! This is our third night and we have had 3 days of rain and the weather is like Scotland in October. Mud everywhere, wet tent, clothes that won’t dry and no washing machines. The boys fell in the mud 3 times this morning which now means that every pair of shorts they possess is hanging on a line with little chance of drying. Euan is playing in his swimming shorts and Archie is in the one last remaining pair of long trousers and banned from leaving the tent. The upside of course if that my hands have never been so sparkly clean after all this hand washing. We have at least had company until today – Rachel and John going from London to Istanbul on a tandem and Peter and Agnes who are driving to Jordan in their motor home.
The campsite has the obligatory contingent of stray cats and the supermarkets have the obligatory number of stray dogs who loiter in the hope a shopper will give them food. There is not a lot to do in this town so Mara and i had a girl’s afternoon and wandered round the town at leisure yesterday – it didn’t take long but we found a cafe to sit and treat ourselves in and i found Zara – yes, a real and honest to god fashion clothes shop. Mara was dragged in and i found a pair of trousers – hurrah – now i have a second pair which means my jeans can walk themselves to the laundry room and get clean at last.
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Early to Middle Nov - Nafplio to Meteora

Somehow or other an entire month has almost past...and we are still in Greece. It has not really been intentional but things have worked out that way and acutally we have enojyed seeing so much of this country. We ended up stayig 18nights in Nafplio - the campsite was incredibly easy to stay on in, despite being the only campers most week nigths (it would then fill up with Greeks from Athens for the weekends). We enjoyed the fact the weather improved and we could spend the odd day at the beach, jumping waves, or pracitising swimmings, gazing at wee fish under the water with our goggles on, learning to fish at a remote wee local harbour (didnt catch anything), building model boats out of junk and then seeing if they could sail (i called this Art Class for the purposes of home schooling!), cycling to nearby villages, meeting the weekend visitors to the campsite who were all from Athens and Nafplio was there little haven to escape to, wandering in the old part of town (the Venice of Greece), meeting Christos the Travel Agent who helped us realise there was no short cut by boat to Egypt, meeting Christos's wife who sold me a great pair of hiking boots which i hate fashion-wise but love cos my feet are warm for the first time. We did day trips to Athens to sort out Syrian visas - which turned into an overnight visit as the Syrian Embassy decided to close an hour earlier than they had said they would on the phone (a sign of the joys that are to come the further south we go), we drove to Epidavros (ancient home of modern day medicine - "more stones" in the minds of 3 children) and we hung out with the two german families who arrived at the campsite just before we left - WITH children - hurrah! they were all lovely, spoke incredible English and we enjoyed nights sitting talking and letting the kids play and do crafts together during the day. Pieter also managed to drive over a kitten at the site.....eeek.........
From Nafplio it was back to Athens for a final night with Ioannis and his family, then north the next day to Stylida, East of Lamia. From this base (another deserted campsite) we did day trips to Thermopyles (amazing hot springs and the chance encounter with lovely Gunther and his wife who camp there for 3 months of the year) and to Delphi (“oh no....not MORE stones”) – of note was the very scenic drive through Mount Parnassus (took rather a long time and was steep and windy, but pretty amazing) to reach Delphi.
On the morning we left Stylida we got up at dawn and drove back to the hot springs for a final dip and a farewell with Gunther. The kids loved it there. Then off we set to Kalambaka to visit the amazing Meteora area.



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we have a TENANT!!!!

Just heard about 1 hour ago that we have a new tenant, they've paid their money and have the house keys. Yippee!
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Greece: Gytheio to Napflio Thursday 28th October – Monday 1st November

We left our dodgy campsite in Gytheio with the even dodgier showers with mixed feelings. P and I glad and happy to be off to better things, the kids very very sad to leave behind the gorgeous stray puppy who had wandered into the campsite on our 2^nd day there and had set up camp next to our tent as he was showered with affection from 3 wee people. Mara is really sad once again to lose new friends – she really took to Tara and Dave and they were exceedingly kind in return. We keep explain it’s not losing friends, it’s making new friends who will still be your friends and we can see again in the future. It’s a tough lesson i suppose and hard for her to see the positives.

We are now in Napflio – reported to be the Venice of Greece. We are on a spotlessly clean campsite and the skies are clear blue and the beach about 30seconds away. The only downside is it is not very warm. About 16 or 17 degrees during the day and only about 10 or 11 at night. Pieter asks me every day why i took OUT of the trailer our little electric portable heater before we left. Heh ho, i was convinced that we were heading to warm countries and anyway, once in Africa the campsites won’t have electricity. Mosquitoes have been an ongoing irritation, but we have rigged up our mossie net in the trailer tent and the 3 kids sleep in the wee dome tent and that remains closed all the time. However when the kids tent got flooded at the last place the kids had 2 nights sleeping on the floor in with us and they got tons of bites. Poor Archie seems to react really badly and really swells up – he hasn’t been able to see out of one eye for 2 days as the eye lid is puffed up like a golf ball due to a bite. Doesn’t bother him and we have spent mornings by the beach while they guddle around and collect hermit crabs and Pieter chats up the old English couples.

Pieter is being very useful in this regard. We have got lots of inside info from his chatting up of old ladies – the other night he got talking to a tubby Greek lady in her nightie and got some amazing food recommendations. She sent us off to a wee place where mains cost 2 Euros, a litre of wine 3 Euros ( i still couldn’t face it, thanks Tara!) and it was fresh, cooked in front of us and alive and bustling with only locals.

We have met an 80 year lady from London who lives permanently on this site in her caravan and has travelled the world. It’d say she was an aging hippy, but i guess she is actually too old even for that. An early adopter of the travelling lifestyle then.

Our mission is to get to a travel agency and find out the quickest way to get to Egypt. It is getting so cold that we just have to rush now to get south. This morning we chatted with someone who travels in Syria and he thought we’d be mad to even try and camp there at this time of year. So, we have asked about ferries but such is the relationship between Greece and Turkey that ferry agents in Greece won’t give you any information about Turkish ferries at all – not even the names of the ferry companies...this makes life difficult. The internet is great (when we have it) but i can’t find out for sure if the winter ferries take cars or not. I need a real person with no racial issues!

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Italy to Greece, 18th - 28th October

We safely made it to the port of Venice (eerie feeling driving towards a city where you know cars are banned and no-one else is on the road) and found our ferry company and collected tickets and made it onto the boat. A strange juxtaposition of affairs – when Mara and i went on board (leaving Pieter and the boys to wait in the car to drive it into the garage deck) we were greeted cordially by 4 crew and our luggage taken from us and we were escorted to our cabin. Mara found this hilarious as our “luggage” was a clear plastic underbed storage box and an assortment of polythene bags – not exactly the usual porter moveables! Our cabin turned out to be quite big, with 4 bunks and a window and a temperamental loo and shower. So far so good. It turned out the only other people on board were about 100 truck drivers, mostly Greeks, all transporting goods home. So it was a long (40hrs) but  the kids found a TV on deck and happily watched Greek TV as if they were fluent (the wonders of that flickering screen). We taught the kids how to play the basic card game of switch – a big step forward in the family, we can all play a card game together (although Euan is a bit ropey on suits and ruled and other basics...). Food was a bit dodgy and priced as if we were at the Ritz, but as 2 of our polythene bags contained snacks we survived. I made friends with the sour faced woman who served at a kiosk and thawed out her grumpy face and got her talking about Greece and Crete and pointing out good places to go on our map. We also discovered that the Greeks love Rusks – hurrah! To a half Afrikaans family life could not get much better...so now we have plentiful supplies of rusks to dunk in our coffee (learnt very fast to avoid the Greek coffee unless you want to chew your drink).

The boat was late arriving and we only got to the port of Patras at about 9.30pm. Then we had to squeeze through about 15 trucks by foot in the dark and claustrophobic cargo deck – a bit hairy as they all had their engines going and some wheels were taller  than Euan. Then we sat for an hour and half waiting for everyone to unload before us – the natural order of things i suppose – what the hell are we carrying that is important to the Greek economy? So we finally rolled off the boat close to 11pm into a very harem scarem port and began searching for somewhere to rest our (very) weary heads. The closest thing which could take us was a 2 star little place which did the job. Basic, but 4 single beds and curtains. We slept like logs.

Monday dawned with torrential rain which everyone said was going to last for 3 days and we had to get out of the town, stock up with supplies and find a campsite. Rather depressing to think of setting up camp in torrential rain so we found out the location of the closest tourist office and made our way there to see if there were any budget self catering places nearby. Of course we didn’t think – it’s October, or perhaps it was just that it was a Monday, or maybe tourist offices close when it rains....anyway, it was all closed up. So we started to drive South and found a campsite just south of the small port of Kyllini. It was on the beach which was going to prove lovely when the thunderstorms and howling gales subsided 3 days later. Only Austrians and Germans at the campsite which seemed odd until they explained to us that for them it’s a remarkably easy journey. 4 hours by car from their homes to the ferry in Italy. Sail to Greece and then voila....drive anywhere you like. It sure makes you realise how cut off we are from Europe in Britain.

From the campsite we explored Olympia, where the original Olympics began and between rain showers we wandered around the ruins, saw the Temple of Zeus, let the kids race on THE original Olympic track. Mum and Dad were in awe, the kids were more interested in spotting lizards. Some things don’t change!

When the nice weather finally arrived we LOVED chilling at the campsite, doing the veritable Santa sack load of washing which had accumulated, swimming in the sea and in the campsite pool (the only ones doing that, everyone else found it far too cold – how to spot a Brit a mile off!), home schooling outside the tent with sun filtering through the leaves above us, meeting the Austrian family nearby who were camping with 10month old twin boys (how brave is that?)... All too soon we had to pack up and head on though, the rain had started up again and winter is still nipping at our heels and we have more places to see. So on Saturday 23^rd we packed up and left and headed South; had thought of getting all the way to the very south of the Peleponese peninsula, but one 60km stretch of non stop hairpin bends and climbing from sea level to above the clouds in 20kms killed that idea. The car has never worked so hard having to climb so fast. Kids were singularly unimpressed to be above the clouds until we said they must keep an eye out for Zeus (where does one draw the line between little fibs to make the real world more exciting and not wanting to fill their heads with nonsense?).

So, only made it far as Mystras, which we had already heard was beautiful. There is a little village and then up on the mountainside the original village which is all Byzantium. We headed to the campsite and it awful and overpriced. So  we started to drive around the village to see if there were any signs anywhere for hostels or B&B’s. We found a room in a house which had 5 single beds, a plastic table, a hot plate, a fridge and a loo and a shower. You don’t need much more. More stray cats everywhere – seem to be everywhere. So we got to explore the ruined Byzantium village before heading off South again to the village of Gytheio (pronounced Y-th-ee-o). The only campsite open was a rather strange place – felt as if we had arrived the day after a week long party. IT was right on the beach however. Sadly the thunder storms began, the waves crashed, the rain pelted and we laid low – hanging out with some new friends –Tara and Dave, an English couple who are touring the world (or a lot of it!) in their motor home for 2 years. We had one glorious day of sunshine where everyone did mounds of washing and queued for the washing machines (of which one broke after the first person’s load) and had tepid showers. Thank God for the Dutch though – one eccentric Dutch man complained about all of it and the hot water and washing machines were fixed by lunchtime! This Dutch man turned out to be quite a character, a professional story teller, spiritual healer, ex civil engineer and has been touring the world in his mobil home for over 10years. Stranded at the campsite longer than we intended (and having said a sad farewell to our new English friends and then promptly having the kids tent flooded out in yet MORE torrential rain and needing to dry out sleeping bags, pillows, ground sheets, tents etc) we were co-erced into a story-telling evening with him and his magic carpet. Hmmmm.  While in the area we did drive around the southern peninsula and saw amazing deserted beaches, mountain side fortified villages of the Mani, went shell and urchin collecting, and cycled to the nearest town for the toughest calamari we’ve ever experienced.

Lessons learned in Greece so far:

1. 1.       Never trust the weather
2. 2.       Greek yogurt is absolutely nothing like what i’ve been buying for years; it’s better
3. 3.       Greek white wine is fine, but don’t have too much as the hangovers are sent from Satan to punish you.
4. 4.       Greek drivers are insane 
5.  Greeks love kids
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