It’s all about steps. The pop group. As was. I hear they’ve made a musical based on the classic songs of ‘Steps’ using their wonderful music, those national treasures of melodies that saw us through the late 90s and early new century. Such original and breathtaking sounds, like their famous cover versions of other people’s work. Of course, the musical is packed with modern-day relevance, and makes me wonder how we’ve managed to survive for so long without a musical about this pop group. To my mind, these ‘jukebox musicals’ are the creative equivalent of an AI-written CV. So unoriginal. So un-creative. But that’s me in a cranky mood. Anyhow, someone came up with the idea of putting together a bunch of songs and then weaving a biography around them, and if you can do that and the songs are by the person the show’s about, why! You’ll have an immediate West End transfer the moment you open at the St Mary’s Bay Community Hall, Lower Wiggenfield. How fab. Not.

No, not those kinds of steps, but these:

The not-so-secret entrance to the Kali Strata and the way up to the village for those who want or have to walk up. These are, though not the Kali Strata. Check the sign on the left, and follow the arrows. The name of the shop is a gorgeous, independent fashion opportunity at the bottom of the Kali Strata, where you can pause and browse after climbing the first flight. Think of it as base camp.

To find the helpful sign and those blue steps which are not the KS, you will need to follow directions. (Turn left at that sign and carry on up.) Here, we could return to the thorny issue of Google Maps Vs Navigating Symi and issue the warning: If G-maps shows you a road running through any kind of Symi conurbation, the chances are, it’s not a road. Oh, the joy of seeing a car squeeze its way around the windmill (soon to reopen), past the Village Hotel, breathe in even deeper as it passes Sotiris’ support market and the Hotel Fiona, before reaching Job 38:11 between the two restaurants. Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further! You can’t drive up the Kali Strata. Nor down it, strangely.

So, to find these blue steps and start your summit attempt on foot, imagine you are standing in the harbour looking at the row of cafes and shops, with the taxi boats, sea and open bay behind you. Over there on your left is Yiannis’ souvlaki place, head for that, pass the fruit and veg stand, and you will see the blue steps. That’s how G-maps should work. If in doubt, ask someone.

Of course, once you start on the climb, you have to keep going…

And going…

Until you reach the second right-angle turn (the one with the view where that nice bar used to be 100 years ago), and keep going up until you meet someone stuck in a car or on a moped staring forlornly down at you and arguing that Google Maps is never wrong, and these wide, age-weary steps are, in fact, a road.

You can then, if you have inclination and legs left about your person, carry on, up and through, and left and right, and up and across, until, by luck or design but rarely by a computerised map, you read the top of the village.

You’re way away from the Kali Strata now, but the steps continue, as they will until the day you leave the island. There are even steps in Yialos, and if not steps, then you will meet a slope. Symi life is full of ups and downs, you see, and going up and down steps is one of them. Unless you have motorised transport, of course, in which case fine, but you’re advised to stick to only the roads that look like roads, and not try to follow the KS up or down on your Vespa. I’ve seen it done on a mountain bike (there’s a great video on YouTube involving a descent from the Kastro church to the harbour, through the village (I am in frame 1,076), and down), I’ve seen a digger come up part of it on its caterpillar tracks, and Lefteris, when younger and not a father, used to ride his trials bike down parts of it.

Anyway, I will leave you with the Tragedy of a Steps musical to contemplate (currently nearing the end of its first tour), and step into my day.

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Lots on today, so I’ll not be hanging around and rambling as much as I have been. So, what can I tell you?
Yesterday, two of the regular day-trip boats came over on their first visit of the summer. I heard the first one and saw the second, and both gave us a great long blast of their claxons to let us know they had arrived as they came into the bay. Later in the day, I happened to look out of the window, and there was the Panagia over at one harbour, the Express coming in, the big red speedboat thing going out again, the Sebeco, and then the other day boats (Sea Dreams, Nikolaos X, and the yellow one), and it looked like any regular summer-season day. Still didn’t see many visitors in the village square later, but our neighbours are back to their holiday home in front of us, and we know of others who are due to arrive soon. So far, it looks like the dangerous fake-tan fake across the pond hasn’t managed to affect the Symi visitor season, but time will tell.

I know we’re feeling the effects of wrong decisions in our pockets already. The price of a jar of coffee went up €0.50 last week, along with many other things, and our basic shop for a week is now starting to look like we’re on a strict diet. You don’t put certain items on your shopping list these days; you put them on your Christmas present list. Mind you, it helps to hunt around and compare prices. For example, in one supermarket the other day, you could pick up a can of tomatoes for €0.30 cheaper than the can standing next to it, even though they were exactly the same make and model, but I think that was a question of price labelling gone wrong. One of the things that tends not to happen around here is pricing vegetables. There’s none of that ‘3/6d a pound, love, lovely plums’ coster calling, not even any pieces of card stuck in your box of Bramley’s at an odd angle warning you of what to expect at the till. Not that you could without any scales to weigh them in first, but I’ve never got on well with weights and measures much anyway. ‘Can you get three pounds of potatoes when you go shopping?’ No, because I don’t know what three pounds of potatoes looks like. ‘Oh, then one and a half kilos.’ Even less chance. I’ll buy six of the things. Probably five, actually, because they’ve no doubt gone up fifty cents while I’ve been wittering.

Yes, things have always cost slightly more here because of the age-old excuse of things having to come in by boat, but apparently, it costs more to leave. An old story, but a friend once bought a ticket over for X amount of ready money, and then bought a ticket back the same day, and going back was more expensive than coming in. ‘Why?’ she enquired, to be told that ‘You have to pay more to leave behind this beautiful view.’ Typical local charm, but makes little sense. A bit like me at 05.00 in the morning when my mind is still in the other room, and the mosquito bite on my finger, which woke me up, is still sore. I must have a word with Roger, the common rock lizard currently lodging behind our sofa. He’s often out and about prowling for them during the day, but I’ll ask him to take on a night duty too, at time and a half, of course. Oh, and talking of lizards, the pair of turtle doves is back in the village square, which has nothing to do with lizards, common or otherwise, but is, at least, a piece of local news.

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Following on from yesterday’s post about the new EES checks, or lack of them, I was reminded of Rhodes airport. To lighten the strain of reading this tale, I have, as usual, added random photographs, because it has been clinically proven that the insertion of a visual holds a reader’s attention. These ‘clinical trials’ apparently can also be invented to prove the whitening effects of toothpaste, the absorbency of lady-wear (now available in more technically accurate colours), and cat food. In this case, I just need to make the page look more appealing, and this is easily done when your husband takes such photos.

And so, to Rhodes airport.

The first time I stepped off a plane there in 1996, the first thing that hit me was the late August heat and the accompanying smell of exhaust fumes and Hawaiian Tropic. The second thing, which was far more impressive, was the way we were allowed to walk from the plane to the cattle grid; none of that being bussed five yards on that occasion.

A couple of years later, Neil and I were back there, and for a reason too complicated to explain in detail, endured a self-inflicted twelve-hour wait. We’d not used the outward tickets and wanted to make sure the return ones were still valid. This was a simple case of finding a company representative and asking them to check. Except it wasn’t, as there was no assistance to be had from that company, not even for a bribe. Not knowing Rhodes then as we do now, we knew of nowhere to store our rucksacks, and we didn’t fancy carting them around all day waiting for take-off at midnight. In the end, we spent twelve hours watching wave after wave of pink and red holiday makers rolling in, queuing up, shouting at children and grandparents alike, and watched it all from the upstairs café. We took it in turns to pass the time by walking up and down the length of the building, reading, and, in my case, writing scenes for a revue, until the hour of our own wave of passengers was upon us. There then followed a two-hour delay during which we sat on the floor with Morcheeba and talked about music and Symi. What better way to pass the time?

That was one self-inflicted delay. Another was out of my control, and it happened more recently when I was due to fly to the UK for a little family tour. First stop, London, to catch up with an old school friend I’d not seen for over 40 years. He was flying in a day after me, following a family holiday in Italy, and had only a couple of free days before flying back to New Zealand, where he’d settled. The planning was intricate, with, for me, a night in Brighton, a trip back to town, a night at a hotel in the West End, our lunch together, and then off to visit other places. It all began at nine-fifteen in the evening with a flight from Rhodes.

Except, it didn’t. We could all see the plane from our seats in the departure lounge, but was there any activity around it? Was there ’ell as like. Of course, this being EasyJet, the passenger selection did not disappoint. It wasn’t long before Mr Angry from somewhere dubious to the East of London was canvassing for a rebellion, Mr And Mrs Particular from the suburbs were fussing about insurance, and Mr Big-Business was on his phone to a great glass tower in the Docklands demanding repatriation by his firm. (Why did he need to fly with EasyJet?) The trouble was, there was no representative from EJ to be had, and I am sure the Angry family tried blackmail as well as bribery. It fell to a diminutive but forceful airport lady to tell us the flight was cancelled. It being gone midnight by now and still no activity outside, we’d already guessed this.

I can’t remember how I found out, by luck, I think, but if one went to a specific desk back out in departures, one could secure a replacement boarding pass for the flight, now due to leave at three the following afternoon. It was around 01.30 that I had to download an app to my phone, log in to an account, click this and that, and find my new boarding card magically in my hand. Virtually. The next problem was what to do for the next fourteen hours, and sitting around the airport again was not an option.

I should have gone to the Plaza and asked to kip on their sofa, or, as I was allegedly on holiday, book a room, but instead, I ended up at a hotel I shan’t name, but it’s in Mandraki and, for a reason I have never fathomed, popular with Symi visitors. A room at two in the morning? Yes, Sir. Here you are. Fifty euros.

I entered the set of a recently abandoned porn shoot. Both single beds were unmade and still warm, there was condensation drifting from the shower, where every towel was wet, and I had to check the wardrobe to ensure the recently copulating were not still doing so in there. (I’ve known stranger.) I had the impression that they would soon be back for scene two, and I knew I should have gone downstairs and remonstrated, but frankly, it was nearly three by this point, I’d come over on the ungodly-hour ferry nearly 24 hours previously, and all I wanted to do was sleep. Which I managed to do fitfully for two hours, with one eye on the chair blocking the door, while lying on a scabby spare blanket which, although it might have been bug-addled, was at least dry.

Just after five, I hauled myself around to the Plaza, and began making new arrangements to meet my mate, cancelling this pickup and that hotel while adding in another, and so on, until gleefully returning to the airport to once again go through security. It was while doing this that I realised the perfect way to lose weight was to stay awake in the manner of a Jesuit Priest writing poetry, endure an eighteen-hour delay, and fret a lot. Having removed any trace of metal from my person, including my belt, I stepped through the machine, put out my arms as instructed, and felt my trousers hit the floor.

Perfect.

Not so perfect was the plane taking off another two hours late and, having not been restocked, only having the dregs of the trolley to choose from. I snaffled the last remaining KitKat as my in-flight meal, and felt no shame. I mean, once you’ve dropped your trousers to a uniformed Greek security guard and not even turned a head, there is nowhere lower to go. Other than Easy Jet’s reimbursement scheme, where, after days of sticking receipts back together, finding proof, gathering ‘clinically-tested’ forensic evidence, and providing fingerprints, they still claimed I couldn’t claim, not even under the EU compensation scheme, because the delay was caused by God. (He/She, apparently, was and presumably still is, a squall over North Macedonia.)

I flew back from my trip with Jet2, who, at Stanstead, gave us continuous updates about, and apologies for, a ten-minute delay which came to nothing as we set off on time. And, with trousers.

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(Not as boring as it sounds.)

The summer season hasn’t even started properly yet, and already the debates and confusion have begun. Not necessarily at airports, but at the kafeneion tables, where soon, the topic of the month will be sunbed prices. Before that, though, there has been great confusion, causing great distress to some of our more easily bewildered visitors and commentators.

‘I read that, yes, you do have to wait for two hours to get your fingerprints taken.’
Not right now, you don’t.
‘But you do! Maureen said she went through Stiffado Airport last week, and she had to give impressions of the soles of her feet in clay before they stamped her passport.’
‘Do you have to have your passport stamped?’
Yes.
‘Why?’
(Attempts to explain, fails, and says) ‘Because you’re leaving the UK and entering Europe,’ which is true/not true, it’s to do with the Shenanigan’s Agreement, but that’s one layer of potential confusion too many for the conversation.
‘No, you are wrong. I read all about it in the Express. Why do they want to take our fingerprints? It’s an Orwellian state. There’s a sinister conspiracy at work…’

Hold onto your kleftiko, love. Here, after this random photo, is the deal:

Whether Aunt Maureen got held up in a queue for hours, strip-searched and sculpted in marble makes no never mind. As of April 10th, Greece has exempted British passport holders from the EES system. In words that even the weariest of Tui Tourists should understand:
Carry on as normal.
Brits don’t currently have to do the biometric registration on entry. Forget all the fuss, and what the Daily Mail chiselled on tablets as gospel and how it wasn’t Brexit’s fault, and forget what Auntie Maureen tells you. This is one rare occasion when you can believe the British government.

If or when it will change is currently anyone’s guess, and why the reason for the confusion?

Well, partly because people don’t listen to truth anymore and make up their own disaster situations to cover the most minor of life’s changes, but also, because the system wasn’t ready. I’m guessing there, because, frankly, the subject is already too ‘done’ for words, but let’s think about it briefly:

Every non-registered visitor from non-Shenanigans countries who arrives has to go through a process that is to take 90 seconds at most. Obvs, it can take longer, because some bewildered folk only remember to look for the necessary when they are at the checkout and not in the queue, but in this case, everyone should have their fingertips to hand. However, even if it only took a minute per person, that’s potentially over 200 minutes per plane (over three hours). Imagine that in the height of summer? Well, there was no need to imagine it over the Easter break, which is where, I think, ‘they’ suddenly realised it was too cumbersome a process.

Anyway, stop beating your gums about it, because it’s currently off the agenda, and just show your passport. Of course, a European one will get you through the Euro queue no questions asked, and if you’ve got a Greek residency card, even with a UK passport, you can often slip through the Euro queue, especially if you go with Neil, who has an Irish passport. (Neil is available for travel Monday to Thursdays by advanced booking only. To avoid disappointment, use your own European passport holder.)

The bottom line: Expect the usual arrival/border control checks, you know, like last year. How long this takes is, as always, dependent on how many people have just arrived, and who in officialdom has had their morning coffee.

As for the ETIAS, that’s another thing that’s been spreading confusion like a Trump ramble.

‘Are they two different things?’ Yes.
‘Why are they doing this?’ Because…
‘The government want all our information, well, I am not giving it to them! They will know where I am…’ Squark, flap, lay an egg.
Hate to bring you down, love, but if you’ve got a mobile phone, you’re already in ‘Their’ system. However, why you think ‘They’ are watching your every move and ignoring the other 8.3 billion people in the world is something to discuss at your next healing circle.

Okay, here’s the deal on this one:

The ETIAS requirement is anticipated to start in the last quarter of 2026.

What is it? It’s a travel authorisation such as already exists for loads of countries around the world. (We had to have one to enter Canada in 2020; it’s linked magically to your passport, so we didn’t have to do anything on arrival except smile and find the legal weed shops.)

If in doubt, look at ETIAS.com

So, no, right now, everything is as it was. Carry on up the Acropolis as much as you want, or as much as you can, seeing as how planes will soon have to be pedal-powered. Disclaimer: If any of the above is incorrect, tell someone who gives a kolokithaki.

No Fingerprints, No Queues: Greece Exempts UK Visitors from EU EES

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It’s around this time of year that I start looking for dark shapes in the kitchen first thing in the morning, and I check my shoes before putting them on. I always associate the time between cold winter and hot summer (i.e. April/May) with spider time, likewise the cooling down time after the summer, as this is when they are most likely to come out of hiding and go searching for new stomping ground. We’ve been lucky in this house in that we’ve only had four or five break-ins by the little blighters over the years, but still, I remain vigilant. So, imagine my suspicion yesterday when I noticed a sudden movement across the room on the back of the sofa. Neil saw it too and went to take a photo.

But it wasn’t an eight-legged interloper, it was something far more cute and entertaining. No need to run in pointless panic from this little chap.

The contract for the house says we are not allowed to sublet, but it doesn’t say we can’t have a live-in house lizard, or gecko, or whatever its proper name is. We’ll have to keep an eye on him, though, because later, Neil found him trying to hide out in his boot, so, when on Symi, always check your shoes/boots before you put them on. You never know what might be sleeping in them. Of course, if you’re of the open sandal or flip-flop wearing variety, then you won’t need to, and if you wear crocks on holiday, then you deserve to have your toe bitten by a Symi spider with fashion sense.

Meanwhile, the sunrises are becoming more interesting, as you can see from Neil’s photos, and the temperature is starting to warm gradually. Oh, and yes, the dust-cloud man did get into work late yesterday, and added the dust to the weather map again later in the day, so that’s still hanging over us. I’ll leave you with a sunrise…

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