Before Doug, Liam and Colin woke, I took an early morning walk around the village. The tour groups don’t arrive until mid-morning. The beginning of the day is dominated by life of residents of the village. Because there are no cars allowed in the village, mopeds speed down the alleys dropping supplies at each of the restaurants. Each restaurant door had a pile of supplies waiting like bread, milk, and eggs. So many rhythms to the morning seem universal. School children raced for school, some with their mothers. I didn’t find the school. Old men sit together in the cafes for their morning coffee. Traveling, we are out of the normal rhythm of school and work. We talked today about how we are all getting excited for our new “regular” life to begin in New Zealand. At the same time, to travel leisurely and without a set itinerary has been a luxury. We have been able to stay as long or as short as we want and go where we want. We haven’t felt the usual rush to fit everything in within a ten day or two week time-frame, the typical American vacation. We can just while an afternoon away reading or watching the world or talking with new friends.
Today we had a hang-out day. After two days of playing on the beach, Doug and I felt a little baked. The boys protested a bit, but then we all had a relaxing day reading and lazing. In the morning, Colin did some BIG addition and subtraction problems. Liam finished his blog entry. Colin and I did a quick visit to the local doctor. He now has the same sore throat that Liam and I have had. I was trying to determine if we all had strep or not. The doctor did not do strep tests but thought Colin’s throat and glands looked fine…The medical clinic was across the alley from a Byzantine church. The church was incredible with frescoes covering the walls and ceilings. Many of the frescoes gave sequential narrations, like the Creation story. Liam asked me where the picture showing the time of the dinosaurs was? Liam always keeps me on my toes! Lots of discussion followed at lunch.
We had an incredible lunch of moussaka and Greek meatballs in addition to deep conversation on Christianity and creation of the world. Colin is eating vigorously so I am not going to worry too much about his health. Doug is already saying we should have lunch at the same restaurant tomorrow. We headed back to the apartment for the heat of the afternoon and then took a sunset hike up to the acropolis, which unfortunately closed as we arrived. The times in the 10-year old guidebook I borrowed are not reliable. We’ll try again tomorrow. We did find where all the burros go at night on the hillside beyond the acropolis. I tried my burro call from my Golden Trout packing days but evidently the Greek burros don’t speak English because I am yelling at “come-on” at the top of my lungs and Colin tried too and the burros did not even acknowledge us on the hill above them! We finished our hike with homemade gelato!
As we were sitting outside eating our gelato, Liam looked at the restaurant across the street and announced that the restaurant must serve a lot of wine. I asked why he thought that and he replied that the restaurant was called Dionysus who is the God of Wine. He has become the family expert on Greek gods and myths. Every meal he keeps us entertained recounting the stories and relating how the gods are related
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