Misano Adriatico, Italy

Our first couple of nights in Greece were spent in a place called Alexandroupolis where we had found a campground that was open, which turned out to be a bit of a wonder in Greece, but it gave us the time to have an admin day, catch up on emails, blogs and also to do some washing.

Whilst there, we also caught up with some of the Dutchies that we had met in Turkey (travelling in an off-road expedition truck) and also met some Germans who were on their way to Malaysia, and some more who were travelling country by country. Nick was extremely jealous of the off-road expedition truck as it seemed to have everything, but as he said, it would be super thirsty. They did give us one very important piece of help – they told us about an App that gives you the ability to access mapping for any country and the maps could be used off-line.

So it was off to find a Greek phone company and get a Greek SIM card. We discovered that Greece has three main mobile phone providers – Vodaphone, Wind and someone else. We didn’t want Vodaphone so settled for Wind, and boy did we get a good deal. We bought a SIM card with minutes and texts, but also 23Mb of data for less than 30 Euros!! And we could Hot Spot our iPads, too! So it was back to the campsite and we got busy downloading maps.

If you are interested, the App is called “Pocket Earth Pro” and it costs a couple of dollars to buy, but then you can download street maps and location information for every single country! By the time we had downloaded maps for Albania, Andorra, Austria, Belgium Bosnia & Herzegovina, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Guernsey (why?), Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Jersey (again, why?) Kosovo, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Poland, San Marino, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK, as well as Turkey and Morocco (well, you never know!) and put all of these onto both iPads, we had managed to chew through 17Gb! But then, the SIM card stopped working! I might just add, that this was over a period of a couple of days, so whilst it was annoying to suddenly have no data access again, we were very happy to have such a useful programme to use.

Anyway, back to Alexandroupolis – we have heard in the news how Greece is suffering dreadfully from the GFC (Global Financial Crisis) but walking around this town, and seeing all the young Greeks sitting in cafes, all the shops that shut between 12:30 and 3-ish, then we were wondering how bad was the GFC affecting them?

Another thing that we are noticing in Greece is how everything shuts during the off-season. Thankfully, all the museums, etc are open, but campgrounds and tourist-focussed shops are closed. Even a lot of eateries are shut. This could turn out be a bit of a problem for us.

Our next stop was Thessaloniki which is a big nothing place – very drab and it could have been any city in the world – except for the dreadful drivers and abandoned buildings and building sites. If any of our readers are Greek or Turkish, I don’t wish to cause offence, but one thing that these two countries have in common, is bad drivers! We were amazed to learn that, in Turkey, once you have your licence, this is the first time you actually get to drive on the road! All lessons and practice is in a controlled environment! From the way the Greeks drive, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn if it is the same there. As Nick says, Greeks have a “do or die” attitude to driving – they are going to do it and don’t care who may die as a result of what they do! Double unbroken lines, blind corners, speed limits – none of these things have any affect on the way they drive, and overtake, on the road!

Another thing that we encountered was tolls on the motorway. Now this isn’t a new thing, but Greece manages to raise it to a new level. Firstly, different companies run different sections of the motorway, and so they have different rules (height of vehicle, etc) and costs. So as you approach a toll-gate, you have no idea what class of vehicle you will fall into and therefore no idea about what it will cost. Some stretches only cost a couple of Euros, but then other (short) sections could cost more than 10 Euros!

As we were in Greece, then of course we had to look for Mount Olympus the home of the Gods and Goddesses of Greek mythology. Yes, we found it, but it turns out that it is one of the tallest mountains in Greece and is a Ski resort. As we were travelling in early winter, maybe we would have a look at Mt Olympus from afar. Instead we found an archaeological site which was an ancient city called “Dion”. There we found a Temple to Zeus (or the remains of said temple), an Amphitheatre, a Temple to Asclepios, and then walking through the ancient city, there were bathhouses, old houses with mosaics, and all sorts of interesting stuff. Though, when you are walking around an ancient city, you have to have a pretty good imagination to see what used to be there because these days, all that seems to be left are the foundations. But courtesy of the start made by German and Austrian Archaeologists in the 1800s, the excavation work exposed some really interesting things and this is being continued by the Greeks.

But our next big ticket item for MJ is the Battle of Thermopolis! OK, who saw the movie “300”? Yes, this was based on the final battle at Thermopolis and if you every studied Ancient History, then you would have read about the Persian Wars and King Xerxes. Yes, this was all at Thermopolis and there are monuments there! Though Nick was highly amused by the memorials to the Thespians that was put up in the 1950s. “What? Were there actors here too?” I had to explain to Nick that the forces again King Xerxes were made up of various Greek City-States such as Athens, Thebes, Sparta, as well as many other areas including Thespia.

Our next stop of our exciting tour of Ancient Greek historical sites, was Delphi! In ancient times, the Oracle at Delphi was consulted before anything was done. Decisions like – I want to go to war, I want to go on a quest. The Oracle was the go-to guru and her decision was final. Nick was full of questions, like “who picked where the Oracle would be? who built the temple? He had a bit of trouble accepting that the site of the Delphi Oracle was picked by Zeus as it was the point where the two eagles released by Zeus to circumnavigate the earth, met. And he also found it difficult to believe that the first Temple of Apollo in Delphi was built by Apollo! Personally, I don’t see what the problem is! His other deep and meaningful question was ‘why are temples always on the side of the hill?’.

After a beautifully sunny afternoon walking around Delphi, we had dinner in a Greek Taverna, enjoying home-made Moussaka and Souvlaki and then tomorrow, it is time to head to Athens. We had found a campground that was open in Athens (Yippee!!) and managed to survive the Athens drivers (by a hair) and then settled in to plan what we would be seeing in Athens. Top of the list was the Acropolis – no not the Milk Bar!!

Public transport in Athens was very civilised! You could buy a five-day pass for less than 10 Euros, which would cover buses, trams, Metro as well as suburban trains. You could also buy a multi-pass for four days which would give you access to five different attractions in Athens, so it looks like we were going to be set! We also managed to find a shop where I could get a new battery for my watch, and they also did a pressure-test and gave me a 12 month guarantee for about 15 Euros!

We spent about 6 days in Athens and visited the Pantheon (or Acropolis), the Ancient Agora, the Temple of Hephastaie (the Romans called him “Vulcan”) – which is probably the most-intact temple that dates from the Classical Era and it is truly amazing. As we were in Athens for Christmas Day and, in Greece, everything shuts on Christmas Day, we had planned a quiet day in the campground, with a nice Christmas dinner. We managed to score really well because the weather was perfect for the day and we spent a few hours just sitting in the sunshine and reading a book. It was even nice enough to sit outside, under the awning, and eat Christmas lunch, which was Roast Chicken, with roast potatoes and salad, followed by yummy ice cream for dessert. As it is winter, it gets dark quite early and very cool in the evenings, so we would sit back and watch a few Christmas or Greek movies – The Guns of Navarone, Mamma Mia, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Scrooged, NL Christmas Vacation, Life of Brian, The Holiday. All in all, Christmas was very relaxing!

As our Christmas treat, we had organised to spend a week on a Greek Island but, if you are thinking “Santorini”, then you’ve got the wrong idea – we went to Kea, which is one of the islands that is most popular with Athenians for weekends and it is one of the islands where all the villages are away from the coast (because of pirates!). We also managed to be on Kea during their coldest & wettest winter for 40+ years. We were in Kea when it snowed in Athens which meant that it was windy, cold & wet on the island. And, because it was the week between Christmas & New Year, most of the cafes, tavernas and restaurants were closed, but we did manage to locate somewhere to eat each day. Thankfully, our host (Costas) was happy to drive to a village to find a restaurant and he always had a detour to suggest, “You’re not in a hurry are you?” and then drive us down a narrow road to see a beautiful view. We ate in some great restaurants and had some yummy food. But as the weather turned worse, we were lucky to find a restaurant in Kourissia where they were happy to cook a meal for us. But we always had a choice of one dish – first day was Greek spaghetti (??) and the next day, they had some fresh octopus for Nick and they cooked me a piece of chicken. We had fried potatoes with every meal. In this particular restaurant, the host was in his late 80’s and never moved quickly. He spoke very little English and we speak no Greek, but we managed to work things out.

Whilst the weather wasn’t great, we certainly had a week of relaxation, and thankfully, we managed to get a couple of days with great weather – one day was a great walk from the main village which was located at the highest inland point on the island down to the coast, and the second nice day, we hired a car and drove around the island. One of the highlights of the walk was a visit to the Lion of Kea which is a rock formation which looks like a Lion, but I think that there has been a bit of enhancement. In fact, I reckon that it was the model for the Luckdragon from “The Neverending Story”. But one of the stories about the formation is that in early days, the rain was brought by fairies, and when the local people failed to appreciate the fairies, the Gods sent a Lion to eat all the fairies and the island’s water supply dried up. Once the local people realised what had happened and had made suitable sacrifice of apology, the Lion was turned to stone to remind the people of the Island.

Anyway, back to the mainland, and it was time to head towards the Peloponnese. To get to the Peloponnese, you have to cross the Corinth Canal, which was built in 1800s and sent several companies broke, and because it is so unbelievably narrow, these days it can only be used by tourist cruise boats, whereas it was built to provide a shipping channel between the Gulf of Corinth and the Saronic Gulf. We also spent an afternoon walking around Ancient Corinth which was also a score, because it turned out that we were there on the free museum day! Yippee!! We also stayed in a lovely Stellplatz where we were offered Greek coffee and an English-speaking grandson to act as translator.

From Corinth, we had hoped to get down to Sparta so that we could base ourselves there to see Mystros, etc, but it snowed again! And that meant that the road down to Sparta was closed… again! Hmmm, a quick change of plan meant that we headed down towards Pylos where we were hoping to camp near the Port, but the weather was too extreme – the Police were closing off the streets along the waterfront and the trees were almost blown horizontal! So we went a bit further along the road and found a parking area near a Country Club. There were lots of olive and orange trees in the car park, so we were able to park out of sight of the road and in the morning, I sent Nick out to pick some fresh oranges – which turned out to be sooo juicy and sweet!

Our next overnight spot was another item on MJ’s wish list – Ancient Olympia! We found a campground open and spent a day walking around the site of the Ancient Olympics and the site where the Olympic flame is kindled every four years. We walked the ancient stadium (no, we didn’t run) and also visited a couple of the museums there where we got a chance to see some of the history of the Olympics.

It was time to head up towards the top western corner to Greece, to visit Corfu. Did you know that Corfu only joined Modern Greece in 1864? We didn’t! And it also turns out that Phil the Greek – or is that Sir Phil the Greek, was born in Corfu! And it was also the beloved holiday location of Empress Elisabeth (Sissi) of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. We visited both locations (Mon Repos & Archilleon) but weren’t very impressed by Corfu. It is obviously set up to attract British yobs who go there in summer to get drunk and sunburnt! The architecture in Corfu is a strange blend of Venetian, English Maritime and Greek – which is an interesting combination.

Our last meal in Greece was in a tavern in Igoumenitsa and Nick had his last serve of Souvlaki. We were catching a ferry to Italy – was this wise, given that about two weeks before there had been the big ferry fire?? Will we survive this next leg of our adventure??