Tuesday 7th September

 

07/09/2004 Day 66

After minimal thoughts of laying in bed a little while longer (our first real reluctance to get going) we smuggled on out to Napflio bus station which is actually a stand. The bus to Corinth was our most modern yet but nothing much to write home about the journey - just the usual mountains, not very attractive buildings and general industrial estate on the outskirts of hyper feel to it. We were a bit unsure about where to get off in Corinth (we were leaving for a very deep canyon but it wasn't until we got off we realised this was after our stop). Brian to the rescue as always. We caught the worlds smallest train station where I sat and ate biscuits. The train yet again was metro-like and full. And the horn was loud. But the scenery was a vast improvement as we followed the coast round, with views of the sea, me little cros and turquoise water and also a lot nicer houses(more like villas). When we arrived in Peit Patras(?) we now were told that we had to pay for our trip to Corfu (and thatthe only ferry left at midnight) oops. There goes our free scenic ferry again. trip. But we thought it better to get out out of Petra as soon as poss.

The very helpful guy at the tourist info (who gave us many maps) suggested a few sights and was very encouraging wit his town. We wandered about, found a few deserted squares and some not so amazing buildings and then stopped for lunch and fretted some more about the problems of getting from Corfu to Naples. Then we went in search of a church (under reconstruction) and the castle (which was difficult to get into and not very interesting (and triangular..?!))

The view from the steps was not 'magnificant' but ok mainly due to the scummy buildup in the foreground.

The old church was very large (larger than Balkans) and that was about all Patras had to offer + many of the shops weren't even open. Dinner saw a return to Goozby followed by a disgusting iced coffee in a smelly tins Station Cafe waiting for oops the ferry. Until this point I had (Napoli oops) not seen anything like the backpacker (Napoli) Greek scenes you get on the postcards and so I concluded that Greece is all about the islands (and Athens...) (to be concluded---). And so we boarded our luxury cruise liner on the first day of our holiday (I decided to get very excited about the whole thing). And oh how did my eyes light up when I realised we were actually on a cruise ship complete with pool and jacuzzi (empty, mind you), casino, shops, bars and disco! This all reawakened my desire to go on a cruise trip. I got a bit upset, therefore, when I realised we couldn't hire a cabin and had to sleep on the floor in a room as cold as a fridge (no joke, I was wearing 2 tops and a jumper) with a TV.

Anyhow I can't a baby. Enjoying it was still a very restful night but I was still very excited about our holiday away.

Now that we are substantially into our holiday, it seems diary writing takes second place to, well, just about anything really. So all I will write on todays entry is a few concluding points regarding greek scenery.To be fair, we did miss the North - West of the country which, with southern Albania, joins my return list. So some huge of hiking expathon. We also missed the north east and east, having to travel by night. But on the rest it is characterised into inhabited and uninhabited and that is all you need to define nice and horrible. The modern, The Greeks, if would seen, are absolutely incapable of building harmoniously with their surrounding and, further more, of being generally clean and tidy. The traverse from Athens ALL the way to Napolia spread out in a sprawling, grand covering a litter-strewn, industrial-like mess. Fences are always rusty, junk always lies in the corner, and cement excess building materials are left all over the place, and it goes on and on and on.

It was only as we chugged along the north coast of the Peloponnese, with splendid views of sea and south shore of "greece" that houses began to clump together in villages and the inhabitants appear to have some respect for their environment. The land to the south became very mountainous (explaining the costal route) with canyons opening up on occasion and cliffs coming almost straight down to the sea.

I was engrossed in the train magazine, althing up on some basic olympic history (Marathon idea unraveled by French scholar and impressed by greek soldier who ran from Marathon to Athens to announce a military vidaloy guess how far it is from between the two!) and reading about some recently completed bridge which was especially pleased to discover was visible from our route linking the West tip of the Pelopollese to (the main land) It was a bit of a world first, being 6sm deep in the center of the channel, and it had 400m of uplifting cable. Oh yes, it spannest the miles magnificently. It shook So, Peribs.. It should go down as one number one one we didn't want to be there but we are waiting on transport place. The info guy gave us free maps, expert us free bicycles and free baggage storage. There was a surprising amount to see including a Roman column well restored and intact and lunch and dinner were both good as the best wasn't all that great.

Even I will admit that the ferry got cold - although It was only wearing T-shirt and shorts (as someone else had stolen all my clothes!)