Birds and dolphins

Spring slowly takes the island over. A few heavy rain showers changed the Harbour Street, which is now often closed for all traffic, into an impassable muddy pool. The same wetness ensures that nature grows at incredible speed. The island is green and becomes only more green.

An Afghan refugee maybe got the spring in his head when he decided to swim from Turkey to Lesvos. But the warmth of the sun is something different from the still cold water of the sea. The man survived, although with pneumonia and flu symptoms. You would think that is obvious. But the authorities here thought different. Because the man came from a 'contaminated' country, he was put in quarantine to see if he had avian flu. Until now no cases of this deadly flu has been found on the island. The results are awaited.

Birds and dolphins we found enough of last week, on the beautiful woodcarvings of the artist Giorgos Sykomitellis. He is from Kaloni but has lived for two years in the mountain village of Asomatos next to Agiasos. It is not difficult to understand why Giorgos is very happy there, surrounded by all the woods and the many woods you can find in this area.

One of his masterpieces is an artfully worked out altarpiece for the Agia Ana Church in the square next to the harbour in Skala Kaloni. To make a contribution to the church he made this piece of art for a little money and created an open altarpiece with a wood relief of Saint Giorgos and the dragon. The roof of the nearly 2 metres high piece is from wooden sticks crawling over each other like dolphins jumping around each other. A faithful lady however saw the devil in this creation and the piece had to be removed. Now it is standing like a devoot relic in the workshop of Giorgos in Asomatos.

Unlike the wooden furniture makers in Agiasos, Giorgos only works with wood from the island. Olive wood, chestnut, pine or whatever he fancies. He uses the knots of the wood for his designs and makes them the eyes of birds, dragons, dolphins or naughty pointed nipples of women. He makes boxes what read like a comic, he makes severe looking heads which have a beard like a papas but also have something from a boddhisatva (a buddhist saint). He makes enormous reliefs in wood from birds, dolphins and fishes that seem to swim on the wall. A visit to his workshop is surely worth a small detour when you go to Agiasos.

We did not make a small but a big detour visiting him. Through the mountains to Milies and to Plomari where the light blue sea made it nearly summer. From Melinda we drove to Paleochori where a baker still bakes his bread in a wood oven. The tasty bread and the authentic old shop annex bakery is for sure worth a detour. Then we continued to Megalochori where they served us the perfect paidakias (lamb chops) and a great ladotiri (goat cheese conserved in oil). Before we ended up in Asomatos the high mountains surprised us with this time real crocus (Crocus biflorus) and Turkish snowdrops (Galanthus elwesii), which took your breath with their bright white tingling flower heads.

We drove through an area around Megalochori which was completely destroyed by a big fire that started on the 15th of August in 1994 and made several mountaintops bald and black. 11.5 years later there still were blackened tree trunks standing upright amidst the new growing small trees and other greenery. This overwhelming nature with rough mountaintops and peaceful meadows made you realize that nature will always survive. As does the human being, knowing the bloody history of the island. They say the avian flu is coming, but life goes on. For sure.

Copyright © Smitaki 2006

Getting lost on Lesvos

Yes, we finally did it! We managed to do a walk described by Brian and Eileen Anderson without getting lost. This English couple has published about 28 walks in the book 'Lesvos, car tours and walks' published by Sunflower Books. The walks are breathtaking, but the directions are pretty badly described, or very badly translated.

When I have to choose a walk from the book I always look at the time they give for a walk. I start to know the Andersons. It is as if they have wings because they fly over the walking paths as a fly smelling food. However we walk, we always need double time.

It is true that in the walking world, people do mend their pace. We do have friends who are alike. They walk like they have to finish a skating marathon. If you do not stop them, they will not look at anything and they pass at high speed all beautiful purple cyclamens, terrific views, nice shaped trees and beautiful landscapes.

You can say it in reverse as well. We cannot walk without stopping at superb views, we have to take a picture of a flower or a tree, we cannot pass a wild apple without looking for more or we have to stop to define a mushroom in order to pick it or not. For us walking is not making kilometres, but to get surprised by the always changing landscapes.

I have to admit that I often also have to stop the gang because I have to recover from a steep climb. For a Dutch woman coming from the Flat Countries the mountainous island sometimes gets me in trouble. Although my condition each year becomes better and better. I am getting used to climb over the mountains. In my first years I got tired just seeing a mountain where the path would pass over. Now I walk as if nothing matters.

Last week we did the winning walk, I mean the walk where we did not get lost, the part we took a wrong direction in Loutrópoli Thermi I will not count. So I can criticize those walks, but I have to admit that each walk surprises us with a new part of the island. Walk number 3 is a walk about Thermi by Panagia. It starts at the beach and then it continues through a residential area, pretty chic. The sandy paths go past big houses and gardens to match. I was most surprised by the Tower Houses, some renovated, some in ruin. These are old country houses where in the past century the rich of Mytilini passed their days in the country. The area is full of olive trees, as well as orange, lemon and mandarine trees. A shadowy land with impressive views of the always blue sea.

Especially these months the coloured leaves of the huge planes which are bent over very old churches form enchanting autumnal pictures. The endless gardens are silent witnesses of a past wealth. It was a nice change to do a walk through surroundings made by humans.

You did not get that impression from walk number 12 that we did today: Agias Anargyri, Asomatos and back again. There you walked over centuries old footpaths, where time seems to have stopped and where thousands of old olive trees are backed up by walls as old as the trees. The whole looked that natural that you forgot that those walls who make half a circle around the tree are built by human hands, as well as the old footpaths which have to be made by somebody.

Now they are fantastic walking paths, the narrow monopathis who give space for only one donkey and the kalderimis which are much broader, say for three donkeys abreast. Once these were the high roads of the island. They say that when you break up an asphalt road for sure you will find an old kalderimi, they are the perfect foundation for the modern roads.

Walk number 12 started at the picnic area of the little church of Agias Anargyri, where it rained leaves from the huge planes, where the autumnal colours and the gurgling of little water streams meant that you immediately fell in love with the spot. But we were there to take a walk and the start already was a problem. In what direction we had to start? The walking guide of the Andersons (in Dutch) is a real puzzle book. And do not make any mistakes because that means trouble.

We did the walk totally wrong (as usual), but this time we were rewarded by the Gods. Everything went smoothly until Asomatos. An incredibly beautiful path wound up to the mountain village close to Agiasos. In the village square we only had to read the instructions ten times before finding the right kalderimi going down. And even at the turning point opposite a B-2 building, we thought we were on the right way.

But we did not encounter a junction where we should keep left, nor did we find a pretty steep climb. The better for us because that climb towards Asomatos was enough for that day. We walked a sheep path going through enchanting olive groves. We walked and we walked and we passed a little church on a magic spot in the middle of nowhere, we saw little streams of water but nothing anymore matched with the description of the walk of the Andersons. The sun disappeared behind the mountains, the clock was ticking time away: what would happen if we really were that lost and we could not come out of those donkey paths before it became dark...

This time we really walked as fast as real walkers do. We chose to follow our feeling of the good direction and not the directions of the Andersons. And suddenly there was the path where we started. Results? Instead of the double time we normally need to do a walk of the Andersons, we only had 1 hour more on this walk of 1.45 minutes. We set a new record! When some time later we closely examined the map we discovered that we did skip a large part of the second part of the walk. Very well with us, otherwise we probably would still be looking around for the right way to Agia Anargyri. And then I could not complain to you about those very bad directions given in the (Dutch) description of those breathtaking walks of the Andersons...

Copyright © Smitaki 2005