Part 2: Palouki
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| Lovely Ellen with me in the guise of a tramp |
Hope you all had a good old fashioned lazy Sunday yesterday.
I most certainly did… except for training legs – complete killer. Actually
since exercising my lower body more I’ve had a lot more lazy Sundays based on
the fact that I can’t physically walk anymore and I now spend a good deal of my
time lying down, waiting for someone to bring me green tea and occasionally
sobbing ‘my thighs….’
Anyway, you didn’t click on this page to hear about my sore
groin and if you did thank you, I’m flattered but this isn’t that kind of blog.
Hopefully you’re here because you’re interested about what me and my freckly
friend Ellen got up to on the second half of our trip to Greece along with the
bunch of the lovely things that I managed to stuff into my facial gullet during
this time. If you’re not interested in that then please feel free to just have
a browse around, maybe you’ll find something you like… Guilt free cookie dough
per say? Naughteeehhh (not really though). Also if you haven’t read part 1 or
would like to, it’s right here.
Right then, on with the Greek goodness!
Pre-warning there were both some huge food highs and lows
over the three days we spent on the coast. Think the ride Stealth at Thorpe
Park.
Day 1 (or 4 if you’re counting the whole week)
Our final morning in Athens was started with an early fuel
up of porridge (I am going to have to join an oats anonymous group as soon as
possible) before making our way to the bus stop to begin the 4 ½ hour ride to
Amaliada. This seems like quite long time I know but after travelling around
Europe last year and spending an entire night crammed into a tiny, humid,
sweaty train carriage with a bunch of irritated Croatian people and children
that didn’t understand the concept of sleep, this bus journey really wasn’t too
challenging.
Although, we must have looked really touristy (we did have a
map and phrase book on display – the shame) because everybody of Greek
Nationality kept offering us tons of advice, directions and guidance throughout
the trip. Actually over the course of the entire holiday, I think all of the
Greek people we encountered were extremely kind, courteous and helpful. Snaps
for Greece.
However, despite being an easy ride the timing of our journey
did mean that we missed lunch and I had to resort to snacking on some salted
pistachios in order to stay alive. Luckily though we soon arrived and were
greeted at the bus stop by our host’s mother Helen who was just the epitome of
a lovingly loud and expressive Greek mum. She drove us back to the apartment in
Palouki and explained a little bit about the area’s history/culture en-route
(she was a fully qualified tour guide would you believe?) and by the time we
pulled up to where we would be spending our last few days in the country, we
were pretty clued up.
As you can see the apartments looked as if they had been
stolen off of a post card and we were beyond smug. There were oranges growing
in the garden along with lemons literally the size of my head… or maybe my head
is just the size of a lemon; either way there was all of the citrus. I did in
fact sample an orange and it tasted like what I would expect the blood of the
xenomorph out of Alien to taste like – Sharp! Sadly my mouth rejected it.
We decided that it would be a great time to explore the area
and trekked the 20 minute walk down to the beach to find a taverna to grab some
dinner. This plan seemed to make wonderful sense in our heads except for the
fact that we didn’t take into account that it was off-season and hence
everywhere was pretty much abandoned. After a long day of travel and not eating
a lot, the hanger began to set in but luckily I calmed myself by taking some
pretty pictures. Simple things for simple minds they say.
Back at the apartment I went for a shower and whist doing so
Helen brought over some bread from the local bakery along with a plate of
homemade Easter Cookies also known as Koulourakia – an egg/butter/flour based
fluffy biscuit. They were delicious! I had one of them immediately after my
shower which set me into a great mood. Everything would be fine we had cookies!
However, our lack of other food supplies
and isolated location meant that dinner had to consist of a bowl of my leftover
porridge oats brought over from Athens (because I couldn’t leave them there
like a normal person) followed by some plain whole-wheat linguine (also from
Athens). I was getting poverty meal flashbacks from University all over again.
After eating we went to bed, ready for an early start the following day.
Day 2 (or 5)
Breakfast this day was some bread, more pistachios and
another cookie. Call me Carbara Streisand. We were given a lift by Helen and
her husband (who didn’t speak English but continued to talk to me as if I
understood him – I didn’t) back to Amaliada where we caught a bus to Pyrgos
before getting another to Olympia. The trip took a few hours and we made a
smart decision after exploring the Olympic village a little to sit at a nice café
and order lunch before heading to the ruins.
I opted for a simple chicken
salad which probably contained the entire cast of Chicken Run, it really was
huge! 1 1/3 mutant chicken breasts (I left the 1/3) a bed of green leaves,
peppers, tomatoes, carrots, beetroot, olives, feta, olive oil, lemon juice – it
was all of the Greek good stuff on steroids and it left me quite full if I do
say so.
Finally we made our way over to Ancient Olympia and started
with the Archaelogical museum. We gazed in awe at the metopes from the nearby
temple of Zeus depicting the 12 labours of Herakles (Hercules is the roman name
– feel like Disney lied to me a bit there). My favourite was the depiction of the Cretan bull,
like so dynamic. We also saw the temple’s ex-pediments, one showing a battle
between Lapiths and some horny centaurs, and the other showing a scene before
the infamous chariot race between Pelops and Oinomaos. Spoiler alert – Pelops
crushed it.
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| Olympia just as good as it was 10000 years ago |
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| Super impressed with how big it was... |
We then spent the cool afternoon in the ruins admiring the Temple
of Zeus (which used to hold one of the seven wonders of the ancient world – a
13m tall statue of the main man himself), the temple of Hera, the gymnasium and
of course the ancient stadium. I’ll
admit that once or twice I did break out into ‘Zero to Hero’ but luckily Ellen
was on hand to prevent me from going for the whole rendition. After spending a good few hours in Olympia we
headed back to the bus stop where we met an adorable pooch, whom I christened
Gert.
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| just the cutest face in history! |
Finally we made it back to Amaliada several hours later but
unfortunately despite being a fairly substantial city we couldn’t find anywhere
to eat. We picked up some things from a mini market with all of the intention of cooking, however when we got
back to the apartment St Helen had saved us the trouble and had left us a
traditional Greek meal of stuffed peppers and tomatoes with rice, aubergine and
courgettes along with some potatoes sautéed in olive oil. What a Godsend! We paired
it with some of the greens we got in town and it was a brilliant way to end the
day.
Day 3 (or 6)
So our last full day in Greece arrived and we hadn’t really
planned anything, well what we had planned was a lazy day, so that’s kind of
what we did. Breakfast consisted of some more pistachios, a huge apple, some Fage
Greek yoghurt (had to whilst I was there)… and another cookie. I was on
holiday, no judgement please.
We explored the beach again and were pleased to find some
other forms of life this time. In fact I was so pleased that I gave chase to a
speedo-clad man whom I thought could be a potential husband… but he got away.
By midday, we had made our way back and took Helen up on an
offer she made to visit her local church. Considering it was the Greek Orthodox
Easter Friday, we thought it would be a great chance to learn a bit more about
the culture. When we got there Helen explained a bit more about traditions
revolving around this holiday (which is a much bigger deal than Christmas for
the Greeks). On Friday, it is believed to be the anniversary of the death of
Christ (similar to Christianity); hence an effigy in the church is adorned with
flowers and black ribbons to symbolize mourning. On the Saturday evening these
ribbons would be replaced with red ones to show Christ ascending to meet his
father and then the celebrations would begin.
Ooooh I love a good old knees up me!
In all seriousness though, it was a lovely thing for Helen
to share with us and although not religious ourselves, we each lit a candle and
enjoyed the sentiment of the holiday and how peaceful the church and its people
were on this special day of the year.
After this we returned home and made lunch which featured
tuna sandwiches with sweet corn and salad before simply chilling out, enjoying
the weather, showering and packing for the next day. A game of Cards against humanity
may have also slipped in there at some point because we’re terrible people and
before too long we cooked up a simple supper of orzo, sweet corn, onions, tinned
chopped tomatoes and peppers - the mini market’s finest – and we got an early
night as we had to be up at six. Well, at least we tried to get an early night
as by this point a lot of the other guests had arrived late and were
celebrating the Easter holiday like any good Greeks would – loudly ;)
There is not too much to say about the next morning other
than we got up early and headed off in a taxi to the airport. Before we knew it
we were back in England and our little adventure had come to an end. The week
went by far too quickly but I enjoyed every second, even when I lost my wallet.
I was also very happy that Ellen got to experience one of her favourite places
in the world and that I was there to do it with her.
There is an ancient custom in Greece called Xenia (governed
over by none other than Zeus – Guy has fingers in a lot of pies) whereby hosts
must always act hospitably towards their guests. I think it’s fair to say that
the help and kindness we were shown for the entire seven days whilst we were
away was nothing short of this. All the people we interacted with (particularly
Helen and her Husband) were extremely friendly and accommodating, most
definitely doing the tradition of Xenia justice. I think it goes to show that
even though a lot of Greece is in ruins at the moment (both in terms of its
historical sites and current economical crisis) the traditions and values of its
people are still standing tall and will most likely do so for a very long
time.
Greece, both I and my taste buds thank you.
Until the next time,
Antio.
x
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