Pedi valley walk/path
Sunday afternoon worked out nicely; a lunch in Yialos, a taxi upwards afterwards, some time at the bar and then music on the balcony. I had every intention of going to the concert in the square but was asleep by the time it happened, not due to the lunch I hasten to add.

Monday saw some cloud and slightly cooler temperatures; you can tell we’re heading into September. If feels like we had the hot August weather in July this year and now August is cooling off, but it may be a temporary glitch. It can still feel a bit humid and sticky though. The only trouble with it cooling down is that the flies and mosquitoes will be out in force before long. But you can’t let them put you off.

I don’t have much to report today, except to say that my new book, Remotely, is my best seller for the month, closely followed by Symi 85600 – the link is over there on the right if you’ve not seen it. And also to mention something about the Pedi valley – thank you to my ears to the ground reporters out and about in the village. There might be some confusion over the path through the Pedi valley now being fenced off. Apparently it isn’t, the rout has changed slightly though and it’s obvious where the path now goes; around a piece of now private land. You can start either at the top of the valley, or the bottom, and walk right the way through, walking around any fencing, of course, and following the obvious and oft used foot path. It’s a lovely rural walk that takes you behind the football stadium, through the groves, along the edge of the hillside and over some dried up river beds and finally out at your destination. It’s an easy walk, but wear sensible shoes as it’s a bit uneven in places. Enjoy!

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Some thoughts from the weekend
The weekend, of course, starts on a Friday around here and usually lasts until Thursday evening. If only! I did have to go to the bank on Friday and, due to the new work regime knocking out my time from six in the morning until lunchtime, the only time for these kind of things is in the afternoon, unless one of us manages to get through our chores early; sometimes we both manage that (or put things off) and we get the chance to go to Yialos together in which case there’s usually a call for a celebratory lunch. On Friday though I had to go down in the afternoon. I took the long zigzag path below Lemonitisa which, eventually and after being a bit rough under foot, comes out at the bottom of the Kali Strata by The Old Markets Hotel. I’ve not been that way for ages and it was a pleasant walk offering varied views of the harbour, some newly restored houses, some ruins and lots of chickens.

Once the business was seen to I decided to come back up along the main road. This is another very pleasant walk and easy enough, though the path is bumpy in places. You simply follow the road out of the harbour on the south side and climb the long slope upwards. It gets easier after the first stretch of road past Petalo. Mind you, I would rather be doing this in the early morning and not at three-thirty in August; by the time I reached the village I looked like I had been thrown in the sea and had to head home for a shower and change of costume. The whole walk only took me an hour or less, that’s from home and back up again.

On Saturday we attended the wine tasting up at a private party in the village, and that was a wonderful night. On the terrace, under the stars tasting various wines from Rhodes (and one from Symi which came in 2^nd out of all of them, bravo Chris!), chatting and catching up and having fun… all very pleasant and it didn’t, as I feared, wipe out my Sunday at all.

The odd thing about the weekend was booking a flight, or at least looking around for flights. I was looking for a one-way flight to the UK for Neil later in the year. Don’t worry, he is coming back, but we’re buying the tickets one at a time because of the, as yet, unfixed itinerary while he is there which will involve visiting Lincoln and parts of Scotland. I was aiming to get a direct flight to East Midlands airport, so needed to catch the end of the season charter flights. Well, I looked at all those CheapFlights and Expedia type sites that compare prices, found which airline was available and then went directly to that airline to check the tickets, only to find them slightly cheaper than advertised on the ‘cheap flights’ sites. It was the process that made me laugh:

Enter dates and details, fine. We have a flight for you for €200 (made up amount but not far wrong), would you like to take luggage? Yes please, €39.99 please. Hm, okay. Would you like a meal for €10.00? Are you kidding? No. Would you like priority boarding for €19.99? What’s the point, you’re not going to go without me. Would you like a seat? Say what? No, would you like a seat? I have a choice? In that case, no I’ll save a further $14.99 and stand. No, would you like to reserve a seat for €14.99? No, I’d like to reserve a seat for nothing please. You can’t do that. We can give you any old seat that’s hanging around but if you want to book a specific seat then it will cost you €14.99. Okay, then I’ll have that one there by the captain. You can’t do that. Then what about that one? That’s already booked. Oh for heaven’s sake… No, I’ll just sit where I’m put thank you. Fine, would you like… Sheesh! What now? Would you like insurance for €30.00? Against what? Not getting a seat? No, thank you I’m covered. And so it goes on: would you like to pre-pay for oxygen in case of emergency? Would you like to pre-book semi-breathable cabin air, use of the toilet, a cheery welcome form a stewardess, a glass of water, any other basic human right…? I’ll go and look at flights with Aegean instead, thank you.

And that was my weekend.

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Symi ferries, arrival circus
Just looking from the balcony on Friday morning… waiting to watch the Blue Star Paros come in… wondering what to do with the day… And I took a photo of the harbour on the long lens as there were quite a few people waiting for the boat. Don’t panic, not everyone was leaving the island. There is always a great assortment of folk waiting for the boats, particularly the Athens link on a Wednesday and Friday.

Friday is a good shopping day as you can get to Rhodes and back in one day and, in the evening, a lot of Jumbo bags can be seen coming off the boat with shopped-out shoppers. A lot of people waiting in the morning were probably heading over for shopping, to see doctors or other appointments, maybe to visit someone for a day, a relative on Rhodes, or to meet others from the airport. (It’s great here, if you want to see a medical specialist you can usually make an appointment for the next day – I’ve done it on the same day – and get a 45-minute appointment, or as along as it takes, for around €50.00. No waiting around, no queuing at the hospital though you can also do it that way and get seen for free, and you decide the time.)

Others waiting for the boat were waiting to collect goods as the trucks and supplies come off, having been sent down from Athens or islands along the way. They will be back for the Rhodes deliveries in the evening as well. That’s why there is often a little mayhem going on as lorries come off, passengers try and get on, the mopeds and cars come off, and others are running back and forward grabbing bags and boxes to put on their trucks to take to their stores and shops.

And then there will be those who are leaving after a holiday. The Blue Star, on Friday and Wednesday, arrives and leaves slightly later than the Panagia, which sets off at seven, so those who have a slightly later flight don’t have to be up at the crack of dawn, which is actually around 6.20 at the moment, and can saunter down a little latter all ready for a day of travel ahead. With the old ferry, the Diagoras, we used to be able to see it come around the headland, from the house, and then have plenty of time to wander down and around the harbour and get on. Not that we did, I was always there far too early. But the Paros is much faster and usually very punctual.

Other people down at the boat are the harbour authorities, the mooring men who work tirelessly all year around, particularly is the summer, the Port Police (ditto) making sure everyone is safe and keeping order. There are those seeing off friends and family and some, I understand, who just like to sit and watch the lively activity that always surrounds the back of the boats when they come in. It’s a good place to people watch and get ideas for characters if you are into that kind of thing.

Anyway, that’s what I was watching on Friday morning just after the sun came up and warmed the day. Now I am going to enjoy my weekend and have very little planed apart from a wine tasting on Saturday – oops! There goes Sunday.

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A bookish coincidence
I had a pleasant and unexpected coincidence occur on Wednesday and it’s all to do with books. So, here I go again preaching to the converted and publicising a couple of my books.

It started with the good news that a visitor here is reading ‘Remotely‘ and laughing out loud. Perfect, just what it’s there for but wait until she gets to the bit where… (You’ll have to see for yourself.) And then someone else turned up with a copy of the book and may well win the prize for being the first person seen, by me, to be reading ‘Remotely‘ on Symi. We shall see. And then, while attending a dinner party where a copy of the book was on the sideboard, started and, so far, enjoyed (with laughing out loud included), another guest commented that she was reading, and thoroughly enjoying, ‘The Judas Inheritance’ having heard about the film version ‘The 13^th‘ that was filmed on Symi, and she had no idea that I was the person that wrote it. Looks like the books are doing well this month and by doing well I don’t mean selling lots, but being enjoyed.

By the way; I think there is a promotion on ‘The Judas Inheritance’ at the moment and a saving to be had if you order a print copy.

So, that was all rather nice and so was the dinner where we stayed far too late and were forced into that nasty situation of having to turn the alarm off before going to bed so as not to be woken at 5.45 when you only got to bed a 1.00 – mind you, I was awake not long after that time anyway thanks to the body clock. But there are no more invites now… until Saturday, oh and Monday – it can be a hectic life here in the summer and we’ve still not got to the very popular month of September when we have lots of return visitors and friends.

But I’m not complaining. I am leaving though, to go and do some pore publicity work on the books before making lunch and then working on another book. This one was the first I wrote and I started it while on Symi back in 1996. It’s going to have a new look, new cover and a bit of a tidy up inside as I cut and correct before releasing it in paperback on Amazon for the first time – in a few months’ time I expect. I have to learn to lay it out in In Design first, so I need to get the basics of that programme under my belt.

Don’t forget though – if you’ve enjoyed one or more of my books then please add an Amazon review on its page and recommend it to other friends and family. Ta muchly.

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Daily harbour routine, Symi
Let’s just clear up a little confusion first. Some people have heard that Taverna Zoi is closed – no! It’s not, it’s still open and has a few new dishes on the menu along with its traditional menu of home cooking Greek style. The confusion may have come about because the Village Café (also run by someone called Zoi) has closed. So the taverna is still open, which is good news all round.

If you’re not sure where it is, and are heading this way soon, then you can find it by walking through the village directly from the top of the Kali Strata, past the bars, and the corner shop, the bakery and other shops, the Jean & Tonic and onwards past the Old Pharmacy until you are just about at the supermarket. There’s the taverna on your left, it’s blue with chairs outside, you can’t miss it. The main seating is upstairs on the roof terrace with a view down to Pedi.

So there we are, confusion sorted, I hope and thank you to the ladies who sent in the news. The photos today are from the other night when we were in Yialos. We headed down the alternative zigzag near the house. This route gives you views down into the harbour and on the way you pass the eccentric tree-chickens of Symi.

The harbour is a very different place in the evening than it is in the daytime. In the morning it’s quiet and waking up and shops start to open, and some boats leave for a day’s sailing. Then it’s business time as locals go to the bank and post office and do shopping. Later, around 10.00, island visitors start coming down to use the taxi boats and the three ‘around the island’ boats we now have, and later still, the day boats come in from Rhodes. This is the busiest time with a few hundred day guests arriving and wandering around in groups, if with a guide.

The harbour then falls into lunch mode until about three or four when the day boats start to leave and it goes through a quiet patch around 4.00 to 5.00 until the beach trippers start to come back in the taxi boats and the around the island boats. It’s then buzzing for a while as people have an after beach drink, get shopping and head off to freshen up for the evening. Then, as it gets dark, folk are out and about doing their passaggiata before settling in for dinner. What happens later in the evening is anyone’s guess as I am very rarely out and about at that time, but the bars get busy in certain places as the night owls come out, and then I dare say there are some rather wobbly walks home during the early hours. At about this time the fishermen start to come out and head out in their boats, I often see them out at sea before the dawn, which comes around 6.15 now. And then, well, then the day begins again.

As, hopefully, it will tomorrow. See you then.

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