Yes, it’s only a few weeks since we were last in Kritsa, but zipping back and forth is to be our lifestyle for a few years. With this in mind, bargain flights no matter what the day/time are high priorities so we were pleased to find a good price for the first Easy Jet flight of the season on 30th March. Our only problem was to remember to leave home at 2 a.m. as it became 3 a.m. when BST started. Greece is 2 hours ahead of the UK and also put their clocks forward so we didn't really have a clue what time it was by the time we'd been in Crete a few hours..
Our old village house needs a new coat of white paint every year (to hold it together!) so that has kept Alan busy. By the Thursday of Alan’s birthday, he deserved a day off so we enjoyed coffee in the village and watched 50 cyclists flash past in a very well organised road race. After this, it was off to sunny Elounda for lunch and a stroll before returning home for the serious business – the start of a new Scrabble tournament. I won the €10 prize last visit so Alan is keen for revenge. Despite it being his birthday, I refused to give him a head start and enjoyed a resounding win. This may not seem the most exciting of Birthday celebrations, but we were where Alan most wanted to be, at home in Kritsa.
We think Hilary and Phil know Alan well, just look at the bottle of wine they gave him as a birthday gift!
On Friday afternoon, Hilary and I went to a party in Elketos bookshop in Elounda that John & Lynne had organised to celebrate their 2nd anniversary in the shop, the start of summer season opening hours and Lynne’s birthday. Although we only caught the tail end of the live music, we could tell it had been a lively event. This lovely bookshop sells new and second hand (good condition) books as well as lovely unique gifts so is well worth a visit. This is a pic of the party girl.
The weather at present is ideal for walking so on Saturday we set off with Hilary and Phil. They both drove separate cars and we followed behind. No, we hadn’t all fallen out, it was because we wanted to leave two of the cars at a distant point. Then, on Sunday, we will meet up with some other people and use two cars to drive to the start point of a linear walk. Then, as long as the other two cars are still there, we can then all get back to our start point. Anyway, that’s getting ahead of myself because after abandoning two cars we piled into Hilary’s to get to the start point of Saturday’s walk. Bearing in mind it is several weeks since we last donned our boots we were pleased to have so much downhill...at the start!
At first we kept stopping to take photos of various orchids, but we soon realised we’d never get anywhere at that rate as there were so many to see. Here are two of them.
At the midpoint of the walk, we had to cross a dry riverbed and if you look at the photo below, you will see a residual pool behind Phil and Alan. They both ignored my request that they ‘go back a bit,’ but this could be because Alan had hopped onto a rock to reduce the height differential with Phil.
Sunday morning the church bells chimed out to herald the morning services, and made sure we were up in time to enjoy a breakfast of fresh eggs, a welcome gift from a neighbour before setting off to meet Phil and our fellow walkers, Wendy, Phillipa and Nick.
The weather was overcast and the higher into the mountains we walked the damper it became as we were only just below very dark clouds. Unfortunately this meant the wide reaching spectacular views were not a feature of the day - good walking weather though! And, it didn't stop us spotting more orchids - these are Anatolian Orchids, endemic to this part of Crete.
At the high point where we should see across the Libyan Sea, Phil declared a rest stop where Wendy, Phillipa and Nick tucked into their lunch, but had to take his word for it about the view.
So, one week down already...
Our old village house needs a new coat of white paint every year (to hold it together!) so that has kept Alan busy. By the Thursday of Alan’s birthday, he deserved a day off so we enjoyed coffee in the village and watched 50 cyclists flash past in a very well organised road race. After this, it was off to sunny Elounda for lunch and a stroll before returning home for the serious business – the start of a new Scrabble tournament. I won the €10 prize last visit so Alan is keen for revenge. Despite it being his birthday, I refused to give him a head start and enjoyed a resounding win. This may not seem the most exciting of Birthday celebrations, but we were where Alan most wanted to be, at home in Kritsa.
We think Hilary and Phil know Alan well, just look at the bottle of wine they gave him as a birthday gift!
The weather at present is ideal for walking so on Saturday we set off with Hilary and Phil. They both drove separate cars and we followed behind. No, we hadn’t all fallen out, it was because we wanted to leave two of the cars at a distant point. Then, on Sunday, we will meet up with some other people and use two cars to drive to the start point of a linear walk. Then, as long as the other two cars are still there, we can then all get back to our start point. Anyway, that’s getting ahead of myself because after abandoning two cars we piled into Hilary’s to get to the start point of Saturday’s walk. Bearing in mind it is several weeks since we last donned our boots we were pleased to have so much downhill...at the start!
At first we kept stopping to take photos of various orchids, but we soon realised we’d never get anywhere at that rate as there were so many to see. Here are two of them.
At the midpoint of the walk, we had to cross a dry riverbed and if you look at the photo below, you will see a residual pool behind Phil and Alan. They both ignored my request that they ‘go back a bit,’ but this could be because Alan had hopped onto a rock to reduce the height differential with Phil.
Sunday morning the church bells chimed out to herald the morning services, and made sure we were up in time to enjoy a breakfast of fresh eggs, a welcome gift from a neighbour before setting off to meet Phil and our fellow walkers, Wendy, Phillipa and Nick.
The weather was overcast and the higher into the mountains we walked the damper it became as we were only just below very dark clouds. Unfortunately this meant the wide reaching spectacular views were not a feature of the day - good walking weather though! And, it didn't stop us spotting more orchids - these are Anatolian Orchids, endemic to this part of Crete.
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