A ride out...

Fear not for whom the bell tolls...

We had Tony, Liz, Debbie and Jeremy around for a meal on Sunday, Traditional Sunday roast beef with veggies and Yorkshire pudding.  The only problem which Sandra had was the bloody Stanley cooker (ARGA type thing) decided it was going to play silly buggers and stopped working just nicely after the Yorkshire's went in thus it was a while later when Sandra noticed that the oven was losing temperature.  We turned off our cooker and then went downstairs into Liz's house and switched on her standard electric cooker to try and salvage them, a few minutes later with ours resetting itself it decided to come back to life.  So the girls trooped down again and returned the puds to their original furnace to get fit.  Of course they were flat you wouldn't really expect anything else would you!  Anyway the meal went down very well apart from this minor mishap.  As Sunday was my birthday our guests came bearing gifts all very much to my immense embarrassment.  A boxed set of DVDs of the series West-wing from Debs and Jez and a multitude of little gifts from Tony and Liz including gardening gloves and jars for storing our newly produced marmalade.  We both had a fantastic day so our thanks to the guys for coming.

The view from Aghios Ilios

On Monday we thought as it was a wonderful sunny day we would get on with some work, Sandra cleaning baking and cooking and me bringing yet another tree under control for Mike and Tree next door.  It took most of the day to get it all chopped down to a reasonable size as it was huge and growing on a sheer bank so mostly ladder work.  Anyway by the time I had it all down San was available to help me clear all the resultant fuel out of the way, it was just about getting dark at 6 o'clock when we got it finished.

Part of the early warning set-up above Eglouvi

Sandra stopping any of the wells escaping!

With aches and pains in abundance we decided that Tuesday would be a day of rest and we would go for a ride across the island to explore some of the areas we have not previously been to.  We went down to Syvros and turned up towards Aghios Ilios which takes you right up toward the early warning stations with some great panoramic views.  Onwards then toward Eglouvi where we stopped to have a look at some derelict windmills, a small church and a group of about a dozen wells spaced only a few feet apart.  There was an old farmer and his wife working nearby, they explained to us that we could get the water to drink as it was blessed by the church.  His daughter then arrived and she could speak good English and she went on to explain that the area up there was famous for growing lentils and they were very expensive at 10 Euros per kilo.  Behind the church up in the rocks there appears to be some kind of a shelter probably used by the shepherds when they are up in the mountains but as the farmer and his family had gone by then I couldn't ask.  We then moved on to have a look at Karya.  This is the place which Sandra's dad seemed to enjoy when we brought him to the island last year, in fact he liked it so much that he actually got his hand in his pocket and spent some money on a hand made carpet, not a common sight although I do seem to remember him insisting that we asked for a discount for cash!

We stopped for a coffee and got accosted by Brenda, and ex-pat Lancastrian who runs a kafenion in the main street of Karya.  She can sear like a trooper in fact she almost embarrassed me, I did say almost!    Brenda told us where we could find a taverna which we had heard about from some other people in nearby Vafkeri so we thought we would go and give that a try for some late lunch.  Alison and Pete run the place, again another couple of English ex-pats but they produced some great food and reasonably priced so we spent a couple of hours with them before coming home via Nidri.

Shepherds shed??

Wednesday night was curry night again at Porto, the coffee house on Lefkas Marina.  Again Maureen organised the event and it was well attended especially as many of the regulars are now back in the UK or wherever their home base is.  Good night, good food and good company and home in time to watch the footy well I sky plussed  it so even though it was half over I could watch it from the beginning.  Unfortunately Leeds lost but didn't disgrace themselves, so that's the cup over for another year.  

What did that Brenda just say??

Spent today sorting out a computer for Keith has he's out of memory (he meant hard disk disk) so it's kept me out of mischief for the day.