From Elos to Stavrouliana
Sentence of the day:
Don’t forget to smile.
Photo of the day : a micro barrel dog
Meeting of the day: the women who attend to the churches.
Here I am, full of energy to try to reach Kastelli Kissamos not on the asphalt, as it was sadly imagined when the E4 was created, but through a new path. I must say that I have found a proposal which is enough interesting, even if there are surely others. My route starts from Elos, where I slept and plans to pass the mountains that divide me from the sea of the north coast, following a line which is as straight as possible, thugh it envisages to pass on high. But I like it, after all the altitude is a little more than 1000 metres. But these mountains are wild, there is no marked trail nor traces of trampling, apart from the hunters whom I meet without ail.
Therefore, here and in other stretches it is necessary to devise a “new E4″, a trail out of the asphalt. It is possible, almost always. The variations I studied with Matteo and Stelios and by myself also, cut out much asphalt.
Today the vanes of windpower bothered me. I crossed two stations of them. They scare and cause anxiety: they are too big for us, little humans. They are noisy, when the vane comes down one expects the stab. Moreover, when I passed the second station there was a very thick fog and I just guessed them, it seemed an horror movie. It is not pleasant to walk under them, so if I could study a new variation, I would study it far from them.
But today I was strong, and remembered to smile, as suggested by the sentence of the day. I walked very much, 24 kilometres. There was also an adventurous passage. While I am going down from the first mountain to the valley, the road disappears. I think: there’s an error in the map, but shortly afterwards I find the road again. But there is a drop, a great overhanging rock. But I find a trace which goes down alongside this beautiful rock and ends into a stream, into the water. But the stream jumps, so I have to climb to find the side passages. Then it becomes easier and I can walk among the plane trees whose roots are into the water. Up ahead I find a wonderful chestnut grove and also a trace.
Today the harvest of the olives begins; in the past few days I had seen people settling the nets under the trees. Today everybody is at work, maybe because it’s Sunday: The noise is really unpleasant; I knew that the olives are collected with a comb, as I did in Molise more than ten years ago. Here they do it with a sort of “edge trimmer”, a petrol tool which spins and makes the olives drop. Around one tree there are even three people with these tools: I let you imagine the poetry of the harvest, when it occurred without noise, chatting while working. Now it’s all a “bzzzzz…bzzzz”. Will it be like this now in Italy ?
In this area all the villages end in …ana: Marouliana, Zachariana, Taboriana, Stavrouliana, this last is a village of few houses (there is not on the map) where I stayed at night.
I found a wonderful place where to sleep. Its name is Astratighos. It is a small church far from the houses, in a quiet area, with beautiful plane trees in front and a powerful spring, of room-temperature water. It is strange: it is not cold, but after all we are at an altitude of only 250 metres..
I had arrived at another small church, not so beautiful and there was a woman washing the floor. You must know that each church has a woman who attends to it, cleans, lights the candles. This woman was welcoming, asked me wether I wanted to sleep inside the church, I hesitated, I showed her my tired feet, she was empathetic. Then she went away and told me to shut the gate when I went away. But I was not at ease in that church. So I walked for two kilometres more towards another small church that I had seen on the map. It was the right one, Astratighos. But two women were there. One was picking tangerines from a tree and the other one was inside the church tending to it. These women seemed less friendly, they sat outside to eat tangerines and I waited for them to go away. I waited patiently and at last they went. And I settled in this nice square among the plane trees, with the cats running after the mice, the spring of not-cold water, the eucalyptuses, the full moon and the small church open at my disposal.
Walker of today: Luca
Technical notes:
Lenght: 24 kilometres
a rise of 800 metres and a descent of 1100
Difficulty:medium, it is an interesting area, apart from the windpower vanes, which cause anxiety and spoil the walk. There is a dificult but short passage where a small path ends; it is necessary to go into a stream for half hour.
Strong points: the chestnuts groves, the small church of Astratighos.
