The rundown begins...

Well, this week as started with a radical change in the weather, as the sun has vanished from Britain it's found it's way back here where it belongs. We had a week or so of heavy showers and quite cool (in comparison to UK) but Sunday showed an improvement which has got better ever since.

Picture: Dawn and Graham getting off the ferry at Igoumenitsa.

On Monday we went to Corfu to pick up Graham and Dawn who are here to spend a couple of weeks in the Sun. We caught the 9:30 ferry from Igoumenitsa to Corfu which takes about an hour and a quarter then a taxi to the airport only about a quarter of an hours ride away, so this meant that we were in the Airport about an hour and a half before their plane arrived from the UK.

Picture: Having a drinky at Coulers Kafenion in Assos.

No problem for us as we just had a coffee and watched all the punters going home from their holidays with long miserable faces while thinking to ourselves that we don't have to do that anymore, no work on Monday for us!!

Dawn and Graham arrived safely and on time and were full of praise for the helpful efficient service of Jet2.com, we got the Taxi back to Mandraki Harbour for the ferry back to the mainland. The Taxi was 13 euro coming back as against 10 euro going out but I suppose there were 4 people and luggage not 2 without going. Super ferry trip back which and a meal in a taverna in Igoumenitsa town - the Cookie Monsters had arrived.

Picture: Dawn, Sandra & Graham having a well earned rest on some old seats at the side of the road.

We had a pleasant trip back to Assos pointing out the notable things which were en route and catching up on all the news from home. Dawn and Graham having had a 4am start were tired and went to bed early, it was 14 hours before they surfaced again!!

Picture: Dawn and Graham at Vonitsa taking the air!

The rest of this week has been spent taking them around the area seeing the sights. Before leaving the UK they couldn't get any 35mm film so rather then them not be able to record their stay here we've lent them Sandra's digital camera and in the first two days I've got about 100 photo's on my PC god knows how much the developing would have cost if they had got any film.

Anyway we now have less than 2 weeks to go before we set off back to Blighty to see all the family we have missed dearly shame they can't all get out here but it is always said the absence makes the heart grow fonder. Graham and Dawn will be travelling home with us overland and leaving here on the 8th June getting back to the UK on the 10th all being well.

Quiet week on the eastern front...

The weather has been pretty poor since our last update, we have had quite a lot of rain and it's well below average temperatures for this time of year. In fact we've had to have some heating on for a couple of nights just to feel more comfortable when slobbing out in front of the television. The locals are, as usual, reverting to form and going into hibernation huddled up in their winter coats and being conspicuous by their absence. We have managed to get out and about for a couple of days though in fact Sandra is currently in Ioannina with Mantha and Effie having her hair done, god help my wallet again. I hope she remembered to takes her rain coat as it's just started thundering and lightening outside and it looks like we are in for a real heavy storm.

I have managed to cut the lawn again this week with the shears which meant that yesterday had to be a real day of rest to recover from the back ache it caused. I will bring back my strimmer from England when we return back to Greece, this will make it much easier.

This morning I picked up an injured Tortoise off the road while walking back from the kafenion. It had obviously been just caught by a car and it's shell was broken across it's hind quarter with some blood but it was at least still trying to move. I moved it off the road and into the grass back from the verge side, I do hope it survives as they are such endearing inoffensive little creatures and it's marvelous to see them in the wild

Next Monday we shall be Picking Sandra's cousin Dawn and her husband Graham up from Corfu Airport and bring them on the ferry to Igoumenitsa and then on to Assos to spend a couple of weeks with us prior to going home with us in the car to the UK on the 8th June. I think Sandra is beginning to get quite excited about this as she hasn't seen her for six months and they usually had at least one day a week together when we were in England. I'm sure we will be able to give them a very good tour of Epirus showing them all the places we have found in the couple of years since we first came to Parga.

I'm not going to risk downloading any pictures this week because it's the mammy and daddy of all thunderstorms outside and I'm likely to keep losing my connection which is painfully slow at the best of times. See ya soon...

a fortnight gone already!

Well it only seems like yesterday since we picked up Allen & Jean at Thessaloniki Airport and they've now gone back to England and should be braving the frost (and snow in places we heard).
After our couple of days in Tony's villa we decided to show J&A the delights of the Epirus coastline starting with Sivota near Igoumenitsa which was busy but still preparing for the season with men all over armed with strimmers getting all the public areas fit for the up and coming season.
Picture Lillys in Parga.

We then moved down to Parga which is one of our favourite places on the coast. They fell in love with it! Busy and buzzing but still with that old Greek charm we spent some time people watching from one of our "special" bars, Island Bar, just on the front below the castle before going on to Ligia beach were we know of a really out of the way fish restaurant were we all refueled prior to going home.

Picture: Tree Jean and Sandra admiring the living room at the Lefkada house.

Took Jean and Allen to Arta on Tuesday morning to catch the bus for Athens were they were staying the night in an hotel prior to flying back to Manchester the following day. We came home and gave the house a real good clean as it had been neglected to a certain extent in the time we had visitors here, although for anyone who knows Sandra neglecting housework is a relative term it just means that she had found something not shining!

Today we decided to have a well deserved break and go and spend the day on the beach, we rode down to Kalimni beach and found it was a bit sea weedy and smelly so we went a little further north were we found a beach with about a mile of super sand and no weed or smell - best of all we had the entire lot to ourselves! We spent all day just laying around and swimming with the temperature around the 28 degree on our own beach. The picture shows Sandra from the best view (sorry love don't hit me!) and the rest of the beach stretching away to the north.

The runaround...

Sorry to be late in publishing this but it's been a hectic week this week showing our visitors, Allen and Jean, around Lefkas and the Epirus region of Greece.

We took a couple of days rest after A&J's arrival as they were knackered having spent a sleepless night in the Airport before setting off to see us but last weekend we decided to show them the house that we had looked at the week before at near Vasiliki on Lefkas. Here's Jean, Tree and Sandra stood outside Tree's place which is almost completed and really beautiful. We have since showed them around the cites of Arta and Ioannina with the mandatory trip around the shops etc.

We went out for a meal at Barbaknackers (true name) the other night stopping off at Lake Zero on the way and saw the biggest frog I've ever seen in the wild see last picture - can you beat this one?

Thursday we were invited to an Election party at Lefkas with an overnight stay in Tony's villa. We had an election of our own at the party which pretty much reflected the mess which was left in Britain although I think it was probably just slightly more tongue in check as some of the policies being proposed were ditches around Hadrian's wall to keep the English out of Scotland and bus passes to cover all European travel, I think that at some point Tony became Prime Minister.

Today we have been looking around Yachts on the marina, there are a couple which I am interested in although nothing is yet decided in that direction, but watch this space!