Kornithios, Athens and Snooper misbehaviour

Thursday 1 June

We really really hate to admit it but after 7 weeks in Greece we’re getting pretty bored of lazing around on the beach “REALLY!!” I can hear you all shouting. We are in desperate need of exercise and something different.

We leave Epidavros Beach and head up to Korinthos. Snooper takes us on a toll road that cost us 5 euros 20 for a 5 mile trip, not happy about that. By the time we’ve driven there and parked up the temperature has soured to 34 degrees and when we leave Eugene locked up for half an hour the temperature inside is 40 degrees. After a very quick walk around the town we decide not to visit the ruins which we can see from the roadside.

We are practically melting and need to get back to the beach, well that didn’t last long did it.

We take a drive round to see the submersible bridge, we’re too heavy to drive over it so stop beside it for half an hour as the middle section lowers into the sea so the boats can sail up the canal. Never seen a bridge like this before how clever.

We end up at a campsite for the night. The Blue Dolphin Campsite, it’s 19 euros with our ASCI card and it’s got 10 amp electric. The spaces are under cover so we can keep the van cooler, turn off the gas and plug in. They’ve got a fantastic little beach.

Next morning we head off to Athens. We are still having issues with the fridge and there is a dometic agent in the city so hopefully we can get them to have a look for us.

The drive to Athens was up over the mountains and through a National Park. We were on a perfectly good road when Snooper sends us to the left, regrettably we follow. The road was just like we were back in Morocco. It looked like the river had burst its banks not so long ago and had traveled with huge force and distance pulling up trees which were just left with their roots and destroying most of the tarmac on the road. We were lucky to get over the road in some of the places. This made for a very long and slow drive.

Before we get to our camperstop in Athens we drive past the Dometic agents but they’re closed, so we’ll come back this way on Monday morning.

We get to our camperstop in the area of Piraeus which is close to Athens. It really is just a carpark, it costs 13 euros for 24 hours, it’s guarded until 10pm and then the gates are locked and its manned by CCTV.

Marie the owner is there to greet us. She’s very chatty and wants to know all about ‘this Guernsey’ that we come from. She provides us with all the information that we need to get into Athens, the cheapest train tickets and the route we should take. She also gives us information on the area of Piraeus.

It’s nearly 1pm and we left this morning without breakfast so we head into town to get some lunch. We find a traditional Greek cafe at the end of the fish and meat market and had a great meal. After picking up some more data we headed to the train station to get into Athens. Marie’s suggests we purchase a 90 minute ticket which will get us to the Acropolis which we should see first costing 1.40 Euro each.

We manage to buy the tickets and get on the metro easy and after 2 changes we arrive at the Acropolis. It’s sits high on the hill which we have to climb in 38 degrees. It’s hot with very little shade. Again this is something that Keith has always wanted to see. We decide on only getting the entry to the Acropolis which is 20 euros each, the other ticket is 30 euros which gets you into all 7 sites, but it’s too hot to be in the city looking at old buildings.

After the Acropolis we head to the Parliament building to see the changing of the guard. Those soldiers must be absolutely melting standing still in the full glare of the sun.

It was nearly 8pm so we headed back to Piraeus by the metro and sit outside the cafe on a traffic junction beside the commercial harbour, it was noisy. They had free WiFi so we managed to FaceTime the grandchildren which didn’t really turn out very successfully, noisy where we are and very noisy We have to be back at the carpark by 10 so on the way we get ourselves a gryro for our tea. The carpark is surrounded by 3 high walls and there’s very little wind. It’s so hot we have put away the duvets and now only have a top sheet, but even this is too hot and we’ve got all the windows open. It was a very long and sticky night.

Next morning we ummed and arred about going back into Athens or should we cycle to the beach, it’s still very hot, but in the end we decide we’re in the city and we really should see more of Athens.

We get the metro and stop at Thisso where we walk around the city through the old town, a lot of the archaeological sites can be seen from the roads and paths without actually going in.  We take a walk through the flee market.

Along the way we encounter a tortoise taking a stroll down the road. We stop at a lovely taverna for lunch which is right opposite the Ancient Agora, they have live Greek music and free WiFi, it feels like we’re on holiday.

After lunch we decide to go into Ancient Agora the ticket is 8 euros each. We find ourselves a quiet spot just outside the museum because we have a Skype interview for a 3 month house sitting job in France, which unfortunately we didn’t get.

Monday 4th June

Next morning we head back to the Dometic agents only to find they only deal with Dometic cool boxes and they won’t look at the fridge, bugger Keith is going to have to do another fix until we can sort out what we are going to do.

After an hour in the traffic we set off from Athens.

We arrive at our next free stop, Schinia Beach which is a lovely long beach. But only stay one night because of the mosquitoes.  There is now a fire ban in Greece and the fire brigade do a couple of drive through to ensure everything is good.

Tuesday 5th June

We move off from the beach which turns into a long drive.  Our first thing of the day is a pigeon commits suicide and flies right into the windscreen. Next Snooper takes us through a village we have to take a right turn, Keith doesn’t realise the deep camber in the road.  The noise sounded like we’d taken the side of the van off, fortunately for us the electric step had caught the road, twisted and buckled.  Keith was thankful that it wasn’t the water tanks.  Next we realised after an hours drive we’re driving down the road we came through an hour ago.  What the f@#K!.

Eventually we get to where we’re going a free spot in a tiny fishing port, it was a little windy but it was very quiet.

Wednesday 6th June

Although the area was quiet it wasn’t a quiet night for us, our carbon monoxide alarm went off twice in the night, 3am and 6am.

Keith has read that the issue is that we are using LPG which is really meant to power cars. Each country has a different level of propane and butane mix. Our bottles don’t have a filter on them which we understand is now standard practice. The oil doesn’t burn so well and the carbon builds up in the flue. For a fridge like ours it is recommended to have the flue cleared every 6 months. We’ve been on the road for 6 months so it needs doing.

We drive into the town to find a gas engineer, but we’re told we have to go to Athens!  Keith thinks that if we can find a garage and use their air compressor to blow out the flue that should sort things out for a while.  We popped into one garage, the guy spoke a little English, trying to explain to him what we wanted to do with the air compressor was quite comical because it didn’t involve tyres and he just didn’t understand, in the end we gave up and moved further down the road.  The next garage the guy spoke better English after a few hand gestures and pointing he finally understood and we blew out the flue.

We’re heading towards Meteora and as we leave town the Police have blocked off the road because of a strike, whatever that means.  The Police tell us to turn around and take the road to Delphi.  Snooper just wouldn’t let us go round the blocked Police road and continually tells us to turn around or keeps turning us back into town an up that road. We have to just ignore her and headed on the road to Delphi.  Along the way we have to stop and reroute.  Snooper 7 hours to our stop, Tomtom 3 hours to our stop.  Snooper is sent under the naughty seat until she knows what she’s doing.

Tomtom takes us up into the mountains where they were advertising snow lodges, ski hire and warm cozy nights by a log fire, what!

We have another unscheduled diversion when the road we want to go down is blocked and has been for sometime, again we have an hours drive to get round.  We drive through a road that’s on fire before we finally get to our free camperstop for the night after 7 hours of driving.

Our spot for the night is beside river next to a beautiful stone bridge.  We have a well deserved beer in the taverna and take advantage of the free wifi.

Thursday 7th & Friday 8th June

We arrive in Meteora and decide that we’re going to stay at the campsite for a two days.  We’ve got washing to do and we need to see how the fridge is working out.

We’re at Camping Kastraki and they’ve got a great pool which has views of the monasteries on the pinnacles.

There’s a bus outside the campsite so we get showered and wait for the bus.  After 15 minutes of waiting no show on the bus we think its not coming, and yes it arrives as we’re walking away and we miss it, its the last bus.  Its too hot to walk.

We walk into town and decide to hire a scooter for 24 hours 25 euros later we’re on the road.  Its fantastic to be able to jut around and we make full use of bike.

Meteora is beautiful how things buildings were built high on top of these pinnacles is amazing, to do it in modern day would be difficult.  James Bond was filmed here and Game of Thrones.

We love Greece but its been much more expensive then we anticipated.  The weather is getting hotter and we need to head back towards the coast, yes to the beach.  By the end of the week we should have crossed the border into Bulgaria and we have no idea what to expect apart from the Black Sea its all inland.

The reality of Motorhome Life:-

1. I haven’t had my hair cut for 6 months, I’ve usually had 3 cuts and at least 1 colour by now
2. I haven’t used a hairdryer or hair straighteners since we left home
3. I sometimes go 5 days without washing my hair
4. We don’t shower every day, luck if we shower once a week
5. If we are in a campsite we do shower everyday, sometimes twice
6. We know each others toilet habits inside out, literally
7. We spend a lot of time talking about toilet issues, whose responsible for filling it up, making it smell
8. It’s tiring doing nothin
9. I’m usually someone who is very good at keeping things in order and clean, Eugene if filthy inside and out and some days it looks like we’ve been burgled
10. Its not all nice beaches and sunshine, we had 3 minutes of rain this week and it was dirty rain
11. I’m not a big reader, but I’ve read over 10 books since we’ve got here, even books about pirates, god knows what thats about
12. We are very good a getting understood even though we can’t speak the language
13. We desperately miss the kids, grandchildren and family, but we skype when we can
14. Internet is not good and keeping in touch is very frustration

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Having internet issues, hopefully this blog an photos make sense.

Hope you’ve enjoyed this weeks read.

A la perchoine

Shirena & Keith

xxx