Busy week and more Tilos

The week is turning out to be busy for me. Around the island on Monday, dinner with friends on Tuesday, an evening on the boat on Wednesday, and off to Rhodes for the day on Friday to say goodbye to Nephew George. In among that is the usual work routine and other things I should be doing, but as yet, not time to get out and do a decent walk, let along get back into the habit of it. Still, that doesn’t stop me wittering on here about all and nothing and today, I thought I’d flash back to Tilos last week and show you some more of my snaps.

I was asked recently if a day trip to Tilos was possible and the answer is yes, but not from Symi. I believe there are boats from Rhodes that make day trips, but to get there and back from Symi requires either a week staying on Tilos or at least a couple of days and making your way back via Rhodes. The only connection from here is the Friday night Blue Star which currently leaves at 17.30-ish, but which you can’t get directly back until the following Friday at 4.50, or 5.30 as it was the other morning. (That’s the boat we’ll be taking on Friday to go to Rhodes, so that’ll be another early start.) A week or so on Tilos is worth it though, with plenty of walking and historic sites, wildlife and beaches, the buzz in the town square, good eateries and welcoming people.

I’ll leave you with a few more photos to get them out of my inbox.

Time for climbing trees

While on the around the island boat trip with the Poseidon, Yiannis and his crew, I was reminded of an incident in Tilos, so I thought, today, I would bring the two things together. Both events involved men in trees but for two different reasons. I’ll return to the rest of the boat trip and the Tilos visit in the future, but for today, a couple of unusual shots, with explanations. In order, Tilos…

I was sitting in the square one morning taking a break from the typing, and the guys who run the bar at the back of the square were adjusting their lighting. Rather, they were rigging a new string of lights on a rope from the building across to the tree. To start with, I wasn’t in the way, but later I was, so I moved and watched the entertainment form a short distance away, from where I could also call out encouragement and ‘be careful’ unnecessarily as no-one really wants to fall off a bar or out of a tree.

The second tree incident occurred on Monday on Sesklia after lunch. This chap was entertaining his small daughters on the beach, and out of sight in this photo. It just struck me as strange how two things should happen one week apart. I know goats often stand in trees but humans? Perhaps these are the lengths folk will go to to get away from me, I don’t know, but again, it was entertaining.

Needless to say, the boat trip was delightful even though the weather clouded over at one point and was rather chilly on the way back. Perfect lunch as always, fun company and a day away from the dreaded typing machine that rules my life.

Boat Trip

One of those quick blogs today, written on Monday as I’m off on the Poseidon with nephew George for the day. So, a few more photos from my recent writing trip to Tilos to keep you going.

Back to Symi Dream

Here I am, back from Tilos and back to Symi Dream. I’ve been posting some photos on the Facebook page while I’ve been away, so you may have seen some of these before if you follow us there. There’s lots to catch up on, and it’ll be here over the next few days, probably in random order as I remember things.

The trip started on the Friday with a pleasant trip across on the Blue Star Patmos in the afternoon, arriving by seven in the evening. My apartment at Elli Bay was only a couple of minutes’ walk along the seafront, and Katarina was waiting to show me my room. This was to be the centre of operations for the next six days, and it didn’t take me long to unpack and head out for dinner. I went to Nicos’ taverna because I like it there. The traditional Greek meals are prepared in their own way, lots of things are cooked in the wood oven, and they have other dishes that are different from the norm. When you live on a Greek island, you can get accustomed to the usual chop-and-chips-and-rice, used to the same menus and places, so it’s good to go somewhere different. Hence, in Rhodes, we head for the Indian or Thai restaurants, sometimes Chinese, because we ‘do’ Greek all year round.

It was election night on the islands, and when the news came in that the incumbent mayor and party had been re-elected, the horns went off, there were a few bangers and, later, many celebrations in the streets and square. The incumbent mayor of Symi was also being re-elected that night, so no doubt there were celebrations there too, at least from the winners and their supporters. That’s about as political as I’m allowed to get here, but needless to say, I read a lot of articles and reports from the disaster that is the current state of the yUK while I was away. That was when I wasn’t writing 7,000 words a day, researching and reading. In fact, my trip was mainly: eat, write, sleep, rinse and repeat.

More tales to come along with any info I learn now I am back on Symi where we have my nephew staying with us for a week. Hopefully, there will be more Symi photos mixed in as the coming days go past, but if the blog ends up being short, it’s because I am entertaining and normal Symi Dream service will resume after next weekend.

Symi Saturday Photos

Updated

Film Festival Update

Before I vanish, I promised to post this news about the Symi Film festival:

The festival is still open for entries and so far, “the early bird entries are 170 films submitted from 42 countries.”  The next deadline for entry is 15^th June. The final deadline is 30 June.

That’s already a lot of films for the committee to choose from, so it looks like it’s going to be a packed festival later this year. The Festival will be screening here on Symi between 16^th and 20^th September. http://www.symifilmgroup.com/

A quick reminder: I will be away for a few days now, possibly two weeks, though I am around next week so there may be some posts then, but if not, don’t panic! Just vote in the EU elections and don’t waste your vote. You are lucky to have one.