Hidden treasures

One of the less known municipalities of the island is Evergetoula, named after the river that flows down from the Olympos and ends in the Gulf of Gera. Everybody going north passes this municipality, because the small village of Lambou Mili that is divided into two parts by the national ‘highway’ Mytilini – Kaloni, is part of this municipality. The other villages are: Asomatos, Ippeios, Kato Tritos, Michoe en Sikoundas.

You can find Asomatos, the smallest village of the municipality, besides the most beautiful mountain village of Lesvos, Agiasos. In the summer Agiasos is filled with lots of tourists, however Asomatos does not look as if modern times reached it: there are no souvenir shops and the village is always quiet, many people still travel by donkey and the cafenions can all be put on the list of monuments. It is the most beautiful village of Evergetoula.

It is difficult to say exactly which spot of Evergetoula is the most beautiful. The walks that are described in this area (like by the famous Andersons in their walking book ‘Lesvos, car drives and walks’) bring you over centuries old monopatia (small donkey roads) and are of an astonishing beauty. Everywhere water finds its way down from the mountains, the forest parts sometimes are like a real jungle and the olive groves with their small round little walls against erosion of the soil seem to have kept their century old peace.

Except for some walking guides no tourist guide mentions the area. Even the thick guide about Lesvos ‘Anexerefniti Lesvos’ (‘the unknown Lesvos’ sadly enough is only available in Greek), with the amazing pictures of Tzeli Chatzidimitriou only brings you by car to Asomatos, the watermill of Milellia and to the aquaduct of Lambou Mili.

The old watermill of Milellia was restored in 1994 and now produces flour in a way they did in the old times. With the flour tasteful pasta’s and bread are made and are for sale in the arty shop that belongs to the mill. On the same property you will find as well an olive press, one which used to be driven by donkeys in the earlier times.

But Evergetoula has some other very nice spots that are worth visiting. First of all there is the lovely park of Anargiri. With its high trees, the small chapel that was built in 1881 and the water that always flows this is a real cool oasis full of shadows in the heart of the island. From this paradise it is a must to take the little path that follows the river in order to taste all the greenery, and to listen to the bees that give a loud concert, and to sniff the smell that emanates from the plants and the soil and are like a jungle perfume with the running water and frogs plunging in when you come along.

Between Anargiri and the Gulf of Gera there is a mountain ridge with the tableland of ‘Pláti’. The soil rich of lime is shattered with stones and in the spring as well it is shattered with orchids. When we went there last week on a flower hunt we could not choose between looking down at the colorful orchids or looking over the grey-green olive groves where in between the trees it was full of little towers made of stones. We thought we were at a sacred spot where the towers filled up with stones had a mysterious meaning. Of course no sign with information was to be found. Are these towers just the result of farmers picking up the stones from their land so that they can more easily plough it or do the towers of Pláti have a story?

There are very few people who can tell you about your findings like the old graves in Palios, the old churches or these towers. On the internet where you will find just a little information when you look hard and long. In whatever way I typed the name of Michou in the search machine, no towers of Pláti came up, they only were signed on one tourist map of Lesvos.

The village of Michou is reasonable well described on the website of the municipality of Evergetoula. I was surprised to find as well the description of a cave that you should pass walking walk number 14 of the Andersons: Michou and Pláti: it is there I remember to have seen a sign saying ‘Cave’. However I never found the cave, nor have I been inside. It is the cavern of Foussa and when we have to believe the website of the municipality of Evergetoula, it is the most beautiful one of Lesvos. The cave was discovered in 1981 and following some low corridors you get access to chambers of 20 meters high...

There are many books about the plants on the Aegean islands. There are some walking guides for Lesvos, there is a famous book about the birds on Lesvos (Richard Brooks - Birding on Lesvos) and I even found a (Greek) cooking book with recipes from Lesvos. But why is there no good guide (in English) where all archeological treasures are mentioned, like old Andissa, or all byzantine churches like that in Ypsilometopo (the palioxristian church is from 323 AD in valley) or the graves at Palios? Why nobody ever traced all the old watermills, why can’t I find anything about the towers of Michou, why is the old Roman aquaduct of Lambou Mili no tourist attraction? It really is time that archeologists and historians get together and do something about this forgotten island…

Sea and Fry Travels

Yesterday night there was a huge silence on the island (and I suppose in the whole of Greece). Greece went down in the football game against Russia and today they wonder what went wrong. The Greeks were probably so obsessed with keeping their European title, that nobody noticed any other news.

It's a shame that the Argo set sail without that any paper in Greece mentioned her launch. An eyewitness in a blog said that the ship left the port of Volos with only ship horns wishing it goodbye.

The project to rebuild the 28.5 metre long boat of the Argonauts based on old technical drawings of war ships took some 3 million euros. The plan to make the original journey, through the Bosporus to Colchis, where Jason stole the Golden Fleece, did not come about because Turkey refused to allow the Argo to sail the Bosporus. According to them the water that separates the European and Asian parts of Turkey, is so busy with tall ships that they cannot guarantee the safety of the Argo that has to row some 3,700 kilometres.

The original voyage of Jason and his Argonauts (it's believed that it took place around 1400 BC) went from Volos, the island of Limnos (which is the northern neigbour of Lesvos), the Bosporus, over the Black Sea to Colchis (nowadays in Georgia) and then back along that same route, over the Danube, crossing what was once Yugoslavia, to Ljubljana (it is said that Jason was the founder of this capital of present day Slovenia), across the Adriatic to Venice, then to the South of France, the Tyrrhen coast, Corfu, Syria, Crete and then back to Volos.

The alternative route of the rebuilt ship that started its journey yesterday will pass Chalkida, Piraeus, Sounion, Galaxidi, Patras, Ithaca, Corfu, Slovenia, Triest and Venice. 50 modern Argonauts will row the Argo in about two months to Italy (22 reservists will follow in another boat).

When the Argo arrives in Venice and Athens they will look out for quite another colourful traveling company: the one of 'Grease to Greece'. This is an alternative rally organized by the Englishman Andy Pag, who already made the papers with his journey to Timbuktu, because his truck was powered by reject chocolate! His latest project, a rally that starts in the middle of August, goes from London to Athens. The cars will have to drive some 2,500 miles on used cooking oil. Only in case of emergency is one allowed to use biodiesel. (see: www.fatfinding.com)

The organizer will prove with this rally that you can travel long distances with alternative fuel. And the travelling will be fun. One of the entry requirements is that a participant must know how to explain to an owner of a kebab restaurant in Croatia why he wants his cooking oil. I would love to see the face of a Greek cook, whose kitchen you just enter asking not for calamaria but for the oil he used to fry that calamaria...

When you are looking for adventure closer to Lesvos, I propose a trip to Agios Efstratios, an island that just like the island of Limnos, is part of the Prefecture of Lesvos. When the Argonauts reached Limnos, they only found women. The men had been murdered. Thanks to the Argonauts the population recovered from this tragedy. In Agios Efstratios there is still not so much life: just some 200 people live there. It is a tiny little island.

Its history may be even bigger. In the thirties and seventies the island was used as a prison for political prisoners, amongst them the famous composer Mikis Theodorakis. Last year the island was the subject of a dispute between NATO, Greece and Turkey. NATO planned a big exercise, but a day before Turkey objected, saying Agios Efstratios was a demilitarised zone, so NATO called the exercise off. Then Greece complained that NATO was too quick to believe Turkey.

This year peace was restored and the rocky island with its pristine beaches is a paradise for people who want real peace. The inhabitants are mostly fishermen, so for people who love to eat fish, it will be paradise. There is a daily boat that goes from Limnos to Agios Efstratios. If you take that journey, you may even see the Argonauts passing by...

Copyright © Smitaki 2008

Greece in shock

The most recent shockwave for Greece was the earthquake on Sunday afternoon. The Peloponnese, the area where last year wild fires caused disaster, was hit with deadly force: the main quake of 6.5 on the Richter scale caused two deaths, some 200 injured and hundreds of houses were badly damaged or destroyed. Many people fled their homes because the quake was long and frightening. Even President Karamanlis came back from his trip to Austria.

The quake was not felt here on the island of Lesvos. Daily life went on as usual. But today Lesvos could cause quite a different shock: today the court will start to hear the case between the Lesvorian Dimitri Lambrou and the 'Homosexual and Lesbian Community of Greece'. It's about the name lesbian. According to Mr Lambrou women from Lesvos cannot call themselves Lesbian, unless they want to be seen as women who love other women (see: Lesvians against Lesbians).

If Mr Lambrou gets his way, lesbians will not be called lesbian anymore in Greece. Even though the lawyers may agree with Mr Lambrou, I'm sure the international community will never agree to that. They will only make the island llok foolish.

If the organization of homosexuals and lesbians get the right to continue using the name lesbian, this minority group will have won a battle. They have a hard life in Greece because homosexuality is a taboo subject in most families. By protests and fighting for their rights the homosexual and lesbian groups only slowly slowly get more respect in the country where the papas rule the social life.

Last week there was a courageous man that stood up for the rights of homosexuals. In his small Town Hall Tasos Aliferis, Mayor of the little Island of Tilos (near Rhodes), first married two men and then two women. Immediately, representatives of the government and the Church tried to get the marriages annulled. But according to Tasos Aliferas it is written nowhere in the law that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. When Aliferas was summoned by the prosecutor of Rhodes, he refused to come, just as he refused to annul the marriages.

It is mainly the Orthodox Church that keeps the Greeks from becoming a little more modern. They try to keep the country demure and conservative by closing art exhibitions when the art works are too challenging, by removing books from the shops, as they did a few years ago with a comic strip book about the life of Jesus, and by being radically against homosexuality.

99% of Greeks call themselves Orthodox and no politician dares to separate the State and the Church. In this way the Church maintain their great power in Greece, especially in social affairs like the above named case of homosexual marriages and who knows, also about the name lesbian.

Many scandals about Orthodox priests that occasionally make the front pages of the papers do not lead to a diminution of faith in Greeks. And if you think that the Orthodox Church is a peaceful community of priests and monks, you are wrong. In the monastic state of Mount Athos, where thousand year old monasteries are and where for a hundred years no women was allowed, the atmosphere rumbles as much as the earth shook last Sunday in the Peloponnese.

Not only was the monastic community recently shaken by the arrival of 5 refugee women who landed on their Male Empire, last week the Church also sought assistance from the government in a row between monks that started nearly a hundred years ago.

Rebellious monks live in one of the oldest monasteries of Mount Athos, the Esphigmenou monastery, and they don't accept the 'modern' Orthodox Church and keep on demanding changes. They believe that there is only one and true belief, the one of the Orthodox Church, while the Greek Orthodox Church recognize other religions and is part of the World Council of Churches.

According to the prosecutor in Thessaloniki, there is only one way to stop these rebels: throw them out of their monastery. And therefore he asked the government for manpower... (see: http://www.esphigmenou.com/)

The Orthodox Church doesn't tolerate homosexuals and lesbians, nor rebellious monks. I wonder if they will use their power to help mister Lambrou, a man so conservative, that he ought to go and fight with the rebelling monks in the Esphigmenou monastery...

Copyright © Smitaki 2008

Cavo Gavathas

Imagine: you are exploring the west coast of the island and when you arrive at Gavathas, you can't go any further because they've built a huge resort... This is going to happen on Crete when the Greek government, the Greek Church and the British investment Group Minoan get their way.

They want to change the westernmost point of Crete into Cavo Sidero, a huge holiday resort, that will be promoted as the biggest eco-friendly luxurious tourist project in Europe. The project will include villages built in traditional style and no less than three golf courses! http://www.minoangroup.com/cavosideroresort.htm

First of all, you should never trust something that is luxurious and eco- friendly. Eco and luxe don't go together. Like you can never fly eco-friendly, even if you pay a lot of money for your 'Green Seat'. Investment companies just put a green sticker on a project, call it eco-friendly and hope that people will believe them.

Take a look at the plans for Cavo Sidero. All scientists agree that Crete will slowly dry up thanks to climate change. Even a child can work out that such a huge project with 6 villages and 3 golf courses will use an enormous amount of water. Will Cretan agriculture have to stop because some tourists want to play golf on a bright green course? (Although it's the increasing Greek agriculture that is one of the causes of water shortages).

The project group says they respect the environment. But how can you keep the landscape green the whole year round? There aren't many landscapes on the Greek islands that remain green in the summer time...

There are many reasons to oppose this project, even if the only reason is that it's a shame that they will disturb such a huge part of the environment and privatise it. You can sign here (http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Save-the-Cretan-landscape) a petition against the decision of the government, which sees Cavo Sidero as a prestige project and against the Greek church that sees money in it because they own the land and want to rent it out to the Minoan Group.

Moreover I think that mass tourism is out. Just like all those silly all inclusive hotels. Those are also pretty eco unfriendly. They waste too much food and they show no respect for the local people. Even on the big tourist island of Rhodes restaurants have had to close because the hotels want to do their own catering. Happily enough a lot of those all inclusive hotels are dominated by Russian tourists who are new to the international tourist scene and have no idea how to behave in public. Coming back from Turkey a lot of Dutch tourists say: never again on an all inclusive!

Lesvos knows only a few of these all inclusive hotels. When the first one opened in Skala Eresos the Greeks felt cheated: The English not only flew the working people to Lesvos, but also the food! So what are the locals getting out of it?

In the west of Lesvos is the little harbour village of Gavathas, not discovered yet by big groups of tourists. It's even prettier than Skala Sykaminia, which is famous for its little Church of the mermaid. Only in July and August will Gavathas have its share of Greek tourists. In the other months, when you are enjoying a meal in one of the two restaurants that look out over the harbour and the bay (there is a third restaurant without this magnificient view) or when you saunter along the street which most inhabitants view as their living room, you will think you have found a lost paradise.

It's as if investment people do everything to find places where they can disturb the peace. Because Gavathas has also been targeted by somebody who has plans that are too great. Between some houses they are trying to squeeze an all inclusive hotel. You won't believe it when you see how close the 5 or so buildings are to each other.

It doesn't look very spectacular and the buildings don't disturb the view of the village too much. But I still wonder how this hotel will change the lives of the small number of inhabitants. Most of them are fishermen and they always smile at the few tourists who visit their idyllic village. The doors of their small houses are always open and most of the day the villagers lounge on wooden benches on the street in front of their houses.

The sandy beach is still not spoilt by rows of sunbeds. That might change next year, if the hotel is ready. So let's hope that all inclusive tourists will not like going to such a little village where there is no shop or bar and you are far away from bigger villages and tourist centres.

At the end of Vatera beach there stands a huge concrete skeleton, like some warning fingers raised to the hills: here as well there was somebody who had the idea to build a big resort, but even before the place was ready, building stopped. Maybe in Gavathas as well, next year this project will still be just concrete. Then only the concrete makers will have made some money from it...

Copyright @ Smitaki 2008