Lazy to a new level.

First of I have to congratulate my women’s hockey team for winning the first season of the St. Louis Women’s Hockey League. The Mid-Ice Crisis capped off a 8-0 season with a 5-1 win in the championship game last night. Clearly they didn’t miss me whatsoever… I was pretty proud and excited for them and was wishing I could have been there to enjoy the celebration with them.  

 I did get to be there in a way because I got up super early and Facetimed in during the parking lot festivities. It was really cool ‘virtually’ being there. Not quite the same, but better than nothing. 

Sharing a cold one!

 After leaving the group I proceeded to sleep and laze in bed until…oh, around 1pm?? I didn’t even
muster

matter the energy to go float in the sea. L.A.Z.Y. I was able to lure a few to join me though. I finally got up and went straight to get my favorite treat.  

 Then it was Crazy 8’s with Kyle and Jess.  

 Tonight happened to be the night of the full moon. The last few nights it looked full, but Jess kept saying it wasn’t. Tonight the ‘pizza place’ had a celebration with ‘special music’ and free desserts and fireworks. I haven’t been there for dinner yet this trip so we decided to go. Jess said: “I told you sons of bitches it wasn’t full the other night.” 😳

  
Dad was not impressed whatsoever with the rising of the moon. The big deal is that you can watch it rise quite quickly out from behind the mountain. Dad said when they were younger they were always ticked when it was a full moon because the fish didn’t bite and it mucked up their haul. 

  
I stepped away from the table to get some shots of the moon rising. It happens quite quickly and when it was up, all the patrons clapped and all I could hear was a big sarcastic: “Wow” from my dad. 

Fireworks followed… 

 Post dinner we went on a little stroll and came across a full on pig roast. The guy gave me a sample and it was delicious.  
Les and his mom and brother decided to take a little horse carriage ride.  

 The lazy day turned out to be a pretty enjoyable evening.  

 

Rip Van Winkle…

Yes, I was up late, but hardly late enough to justify sleeping until 1pm. I woke up briefly at 7:30. Then I was ready to go at 11:00, but it appeared nobody else was so I put on my favorite play list and layed down again.  It’s so hot in the middle of the day anyway it makes it nearly impossible to do anything anyway. 

We finally got going and headed to Gnospi.  

 The major excitement came a little later in the evening when Jess FINALLY fulfilled a fraction of the contract she made with my dad about 6 years ago. You see, Jess was desperate for a cell phone and Dad was willing to buy her one on the condition that she would agree to clip his toe nails 25 times. Well, I’m not sure what your dads’ feet/toes are like, but this contract shows just  exactly how desperate young Jess truly was. She wrote up the contract and it was signed by both parties. Before today, I believe Jess got through one half of one section of the contract. She still owed him 24 1/2 pedicures… 

 

  Dad showing his appreciation with a heart.  

 She even spruced them up with some clear nail polish! The best when dad was showing his buddy her handy work in the middle of the cafe.  

 Uncle George has a fig tree in his garden and they are starting to come into season.  

 My sister isn’t a fan but I sure like them. Yum, fresh off the tree. 

A little pre-dinner ice cream… 

 Priest out for a stroll… 

 A pretty low key day. 

Hangry

I’ve eaten the same thing every night that I’ve been here. Souvlaki with Greek salad and fries. It’s outstanding so why change, right? However yesterday I was dying for a gyro, but the place doesn’t open until about 5pm or so. I showered and got ready and headed down there to get my pre dinner snack. “No ready yet, 20 minutes.”  Aaaaaaaah.  

20 minutes later: “No yet, 35 minutes…” Oh. My. God. 

Finally I got my long anticipated Gyro.  

I have to say I was a little disappointed. Not near enough meat. Perhaps I had it built up in my head too much, but meh. 

Just for the record, the pronunciations is yee-ro not the hard G as in ‘gyroscope.’ 

I think I’m a little hangry right now…

Gone Fishin’

I woke up fairly early today and headed over to the house to check out what my Dad and Uncle George were up to. It turns out UG was getting some kind of bait concoction together to put into his ‘baskets’ in order to wrangle some fish for dinner.  

He builds this huge bread crumb with some anchovies and makes a paste ball and puts it in those green things that you can see behind him.  

 We headed out in the boat and dropped them in a few locations around the corner from the house.   

Blues Fan.

After he dumps them in the water you leave them for a few hours and pull them up and enjoy your wares.  

 Above is a pic of my Dad hassling his little bro about his underwear sticking up from the back of his shorts.  Dad was bugging him that he did it on purpose because they were Tommy Hilfiger. Uncle Geroge went crazy. It was hilarious.  He’s such a character. On the scale of expressive and passionate and loud, he tops the charts in all three. He lived in Canada for a short time a looooong time ago, but it’s amazing how well he speaks English. Regardless,  English or Greeek, it is just fun to watch him speak because he gets so worked up so quickly. He’s hilarious. 

It was a scorcher today. 41 Celsius. After dumping the baskets it was time for a little dip followed by some relaxing in the shade.    

 Gnospi is a beautiful place known mostly to locals and so it is never overly crowded. If you look at about 9 o’clock you see a flat area where everyone hangs out. It’s all flat rock with a nice launch pad into 15′ deep water. It’s about a 5 minute walk from the house which means you don’t have to haul a bunch of crap with you. You can do for 20 or 30 minutes or spend the whole day if you like. It’s a great way to cool off and relax. 

At around 4 o’clock or so it was time to go get the baskets. My dad, Uncle George, my Bro in Law, Les headed out in Dad’s boat this time. We got to the first basket with a great deal of anticipation were disappointed in our haul. 5 measily fish. Not even enough for a meal.   
 

It was still fun watching a real live old school Greek fisherman in action. Cool stuff! 

When I was a little kid I would spend hours fishing off the docks around where the boats are. I  would spend HOURS catching fish with only a line and some hooks and ‘tholo’ which is bread and feta cheese mashed together and rolled into a ball. The kids wanted to try it and anytime I can use them as an excuse to do things that normally a 42 year old women wouldn’t do on her own, I jump at the chance. 
We got our supplies and headed to the port. It want more than 10 minutes in that I got one!  

Yeah, its hard to see, but its dangling from the line in my right hand.

 Yes it’s just small and basically only good for feeding the stray cats with, but it was a thrill to catch one again after 30+ years. I was pumped!! 
I had all he intentions BEFORE I caught a fish to give it to the cats but I felt so sorry for it I couldn’t get it off the line quick enough to release it. Poor thing. Was fun though!!

The kids came close to snagging one or two of their own but not quite. We will try again tomorrow. 

After that, a nice walk to dinner.  

It was a good day. 

        

Random…

I am renting the house right next door to my Dad’s childhood home. Remember this pic:  

Black: family home, Red: Rental

It’s actually a really nice place, but there are a ton of stairs to get to the bedrooms. Every day the kids come by and ring the annoying doorbell to get me to let them in. Rather than run down the stairs I just toss the keys over the balcony so they can let themselves in.

Today as Jess was standing outside awaiting to get inside to my air conditioned house, I used my position of power to my full advantage. Before I dropped the keys she has to promise to get me some bread and olive oil and feta cheese as a snack. The negotiation was real and failure on her part would result in me never tossing the keys down again.  

Promise, Jess?

She’s a great kid, and we enjoyed a wonderful snack together. Thanks Jess 😁

  

Under the sea.

Today started early, around 7:30am. It lasted until I plugged in the GoPro to charge and then at about 7:45 I went back to sleep until about 12:30. Oh yeah…vacation mode fully engaged…

After going on the hunt for some lunch we decided to go snorkeling at the ‘Halikoura’ which means–place by the rocks. It’s basically right in front of the house.  

Halikoura

There really isn’t that much to see down there. A few fish of varying size reaching not much more than 12″ long and some sea urchins. It was still quite relaxing just floating and looking down at the whole world beneath the sea. Because the water is so salty, one is very buoyant and can literally just float and relax. Quite peaceful actually. The sunburn on my back says otherwise, however. 

 Before our swim we went to the ‘pizza place’ that has been there for ages. I was here when I was 9 years old and there was a roller skating rink that we used to skate on at times. My sister and I were practically professional roller skaters since we had a LOT of practice shooting the duck in our basement so I was very comfortable in my skates. 
One night, however, we were skating around and I just went up to the edge of the bar to say hello to somebody and the unthinkable happened. I lost my footing and my skates slipped behind me and in the blink of an eye I slammed my mouth onto the bar and chipped my two front teeth basically in half. Today I went back to the scene of the accident.  

It’s run down and looks like it is used as a bit of a play area for kids, but the memories for me at that place run deep. 

The worst part of the story isn’t actually that I chipped my teeth, but that I didn’t really get them repaired until the last 7 years or so! I walked around like a half toothed hillbilly well into my adult years. I guess I just got used to the way it looked and never bothered with it. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who knew me at the time for that. Thanks for letting me walk around like a hillbilly. Next time I have toilet paper hanging out of the back of my pants, make sure you keep that to yourselves as well. 😠

After the shower it was a puppet show with the kids.  

It was a murder trial. Jess was the judge, Jai the star witness, Kyke the defendant and i was the defense lawyer. He got acquitted…

Then some refreshments and dinner. 

This one place makes the best fresh squeezed OJ. The orange that gets served with was possibly the orangest (is that a word) orange  I have ever seen.  

Isnt it lovely?

After a brief walk after dinner I hit a wall and got super tired. In bed by 10:30 I anticipated I might be up somewhere in the middle of the night, but instead I woke up at 12:30 haha. So here I sit at 3 am writing the blog. It’s actually a good time because there is no traffic on the internet that I am scooping from the restaurant across the way 😁

Hopefully the Internet in my house will be hooked up soon and I will no longer have to sit out on the balcony and get eaten alive by Greek Mosquitos. 

 

A good day.

If you read my last blog post you would know that I sat up from 3am until about 7:30. As I tried to nap I couldn’t stop thinking about bread and feta cheese so I got up and headed to the grocery store. The bread was still warm…

I hit the wall at about 10:30 and slept until my nieces came ringing my bell at around 2:15 and wanted to go swimming. I told them to go away but they just laughed at me. I had to get up. 

  
A little later we rented bikes and decided to head to another little town about 3km’s away (around 2 miles or so…) just to check things out.   

There is a lot more tourists and action in Stoupa if you are interested in that. It is a beautiful large sandy beach with heaps of restaurants that line the waterfront. It’s a great spot.  

   

  
The way home was even better on the bikes. The sun was setting and it was cooling down to such an enjoyable temperature. En route to Stoupa you see all kinds of nearly finished homes or hotels. Here you see a huge church that looks mostly done…except it has rebar sticking out all over the place.  

Also along the way, Sis and I walked down these stairs and checked out the salt pools.  

It was on that very spot only a few years back when Sis, and her daughter Jaiden, were checking out what was down these steps when a bat came flying out of the brush. Now I wasn’t there to witness it, but apparently she had her purse off of her shoulder and was swinging at it before she even knew what she was doing. “Mom takes her purse off and swings at it like an old lady…”  They couldn’t stop laughing. 

  There is all this craggy rocks and areas where water pools down there. Well when the water evaporates the salt from the sea remains. I scraped off as much as I could and stuffed my pockets full.  I am bringing it back for the STLWHL Board to use on the rims of their margarita’s. Hope you all enjoy it… 

On the way there Kyle thought it would be a good idea to scare the crap out of me by jumping out from behind a bush. It nearly worked, and unfortunately for me, he caught it on the GoPro. If I ever figure it out? and it isn’t totally mortifying,  I will try to get the vid up. That should be great…

After dinner the evening concluded with some some good old fashioned skateboarding. I was a little shaky at first but it was pretty enjoyable. I guess I did okay because Jess invited me back.  

Dad

I stayed up until a normal time to go to bed, but still woke up and here I sit on my balcony at 3:00am. It’s actually very beautiful at this hour. Sitting here listening to the ebb and flow of the sea and the odd leftover conversation from the night before. The house I am renting doesn’t have wifi yet, but I am managing to scoop some from a nearby restaurant. It’s nice out. 

This is my 4th time to my dad’s village, the village he was born in. It’s amazing to me that he was a little boy wandering around these same streets as I did, and now my nieces are. 

Probably one of my favorite things about this place is watching my dad absolutely glow. For those who know him you know that he is a very upbeat, happy go lucky guy, with a great sense of humor. He’s emotional and expressive like most Greeks, and has a spirit and a passion for life like very few. He’s a story teller and a practical joker. As my sister says: “He’s at the top of his game here,” and she’s absolutely right. Watching him sit around and joke and laugh with his friends who he grew up with is heartwarming. He gets this twinkle in his eye, and a sneaky little grin that lets you know the next words out of his mouth are going to be hilarious or a total set up. Spending time with him, here in his element is priceless, and worth every bit of cost and tiring travel. 

He’s a pretty neat guy.  

Dad on the left messing with Godolia and the ‘ Judge’

Made it.

 

I think I may be getting close to 24 hours awake since I left St. Louis, but I have been forced to stay awake so as to minimize the jet lag situation. I’m a little out of it and I could use a shower, but I’m enjoying just relaxing at the cafe finally getting to use some wifi. 

The trip went as smooth as can be quite frankly. The worst part was the 3 hour car ride from Athens to the village. About an hour into that ride I was so over the traveling thing and it was all I could do to even stay upright. In fact, I didn’t. I was slumped in the back of George’s car, using my favorite playlist to muffle the chatter of he and my dad’s fishing stories.  

After getting unpacked and somewhat sorted out, I joined my sister and family at the cafe for some cheese pie and fries. I ate a heap on the plane so I didn’t have much of anything. Don’t worry, I’ll be getting my fill of souvlaki and feta cheese a little later. 

 I tried to take this selfie myself but I just don’t have the knack. Where is Em and that damn selfie stick when you need her?! Jess certainly did a fine job. 

Nothing too thrilling to write about at this point. The weather is perfect and the village looks even better than I remember. Cleaner. So far so good.  

Flying solo.

Here I go, the first leg of my journey has begun. Hitch ended up canceling his trip because he wasn’t feeling quite up to coming so it’s just me. Just me and my carry-ons. 

I’m looking forward to seeing my family and spending time with my nieces,  but I will definitely miss my hockey peeps. I’m having such a great time with the STLWHL and my team, the Mid-Ice Crisis it’s hard to leave them! I will be beside my phone next Thursday when we are playing District 5 for the League Championship. Get after it girls!!

My flight goes Stl to Atlanta to Paris to Athens to the seat of one of my dads’ cousins car for three hours. Not exactly an easy place to get to but it will be worth it.