Cretanvista Site & Local News - April 30th 2005 Issue 27 |
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No links to sites with adult content accepted |
APRIL
WEATHER ... _____________________________ Village life A bed of roses ... or is it asphalt? Where did I put that mop? We've lived in Crete for a whole year now and when Ann's sister decided to visit for the first time in April, we flew into a panic of painting, weeding, cleaning and sewing prior to her arrival. Now she's not really the sort to run her finger along the top of the mantelpiece and sniff disapprovingly (dust we have plenty of - this is Crete), but you know what it's like. Horrors! Two weeks before she was due to arrive, a JCB began excavating foundations for a new house, not twenty yards from our front door. Just when we had dusted off the ironing mountain and organized the fluff bunnies into neat heaps! But no - panic over. A boundary dispute meant no further work on the site for the foreseeable future - but also resulted in a temporary fence across our driveway. Luckily we had an 'in' and an 'out'. So now we have to in and out of the 'out' for the time being, if you follow. Four days to arrival of sister and the house was looking bright and shiny. The local council had obviously heard about the impending 'royal visit' as they now took it upon themselves to upgrade the road to our village. JCBs came and took away the existing road and tipped it into the olive grove below. For twenty four tense hours the only way in and out of the village was by a three kilometer detour on an agricultural track. Two days to Arrival Day .. and the asphalting team appeared. All day the steaming lorries ground up the hill from town; all day the team of five brawny men shoveled and spread the asphalt. This was the most action our quiet village has seen in a long time and several of the older inhabitants brought their chairs out and sat by the side of the road to watch. The tar was fresh and glistening when the local shepherd brought his flock out for their daily foraging. Did he detour them through the olive grove? He did not. Perhaps he thought tar boots on his sheep would help to prevent foot-rot? Give credit where credit's due, the new road looks fantastic. Only now, some weeks later, are plants beginning to grow up through it... We love it when people come to stay with us for the first time, because we can show them some of our beautiful island. (Mind you, we love it when they go home as well, but that's another story). Because Ann's sister is another wildflower fanatic, we had some wonderful trips out and about. The highspot for flower-watching was a drive over the mountains to Paleohora on the south coast, past sheets of sapphire-blue lupins, with pink and white cistus and yellow rock roses studding the rocks as we passed. We stayed just long enough in Paleohora to have an absolutely delicious meal at a vegetarian restaurant, then leaped back into the car to take a different route home. Poor old Richard, acting as driver/photographer, did all the hard work on those twisty roads! Whilst on the subject of flowers, please do spend some time looking at Wilf's fantastic flower photographs - see right. We can vouch for the time and care he spends in getting each shot perfect - he's the gent lying for ages in the road with his head in the verge ... Of course, here in Crete, April has been part of the Greek Orthodox Church's Lent, culminating on Easter Day on May 1st. As this was our first Easter here, we were keen to learn and respect all the local traditions. 'Clean Monday' was the first day of Lent, when the mums give the house a good spring-clean and the dads take the kids off kite-flying. Down by the seashore there were scores of brightly coloured kites being flown (by the dads), while the kids looked on enviously. Many of the older people have been on a meat-free diet for the whole of Lent and for the final week (Megalo Evthomada - Big Week) they also abstained from cheese, other dairy products, oil and anything with a backbone. Consequently, by the time they all meet in church on Good Friday, many of them are looking decidedly washed-out. On Good Friday, April 29th, the women from our village raided their gardens and took thousands of flowers up to the church to decorate the 'epitaphion' - something between a funeral bier and a sedan chair. It was a real triumph - a riot of colour topped with a cross of white and red carnations and all hung about with fragrant lemon blossom. This lay in the church until the evening when there was a (lengthy) service, during which the epitaphion was processed around the outside of the church, followed by the congregation carrying lighted candles. The younger members of the congregation were allowed to crawl/limbo under the epitaphion, but a combination of middle age and embarrassment prevented us from joining in! |
Site News Spot the difference ...... If you notice a slight change in style this month, please don't blame Wilf - he has temporarily swapped the 'hot seat' for a comfortable chair and is having a well-earned break. He's loaned the reins to book-reviewing Ann (who will be doing the easy stuff) and her partner Richard (who will be doing the twiddly bits), so please address all criticism to them and not Wilf! Making it all the easier for you ...... You probably already know that we offer several different spellings of our site name. So people mis-typing or who have mislaid their reading glasses can still find us. We also use different ISP's and domain endings to ensure continuous access. Try it: www.cretanvistas.co.uk really is no different to www.cretanvista.gr - except that you receive them from different parts of the world.
Cretan Vista Calendars Wild Flowers:
A further two pages of the flower galleries (Gallery pages 7 & 8), making 96 different flowers. The next two pages
are en-route. We have more than 3,500 flower photographs in our
databases. The initial flower galleries will become an on-line book -
right here on site, very printer friendly - for personal use only. The galleries of
Wilf and Pam's Athens visit at Christmas and New Year will follow in a couple of
months.. Are we listening, do we hear? To our visitors who have taken the time to tell us that they have found our site enjoyable/ informative/ helpful/ or otherwise complimented the site - very many thanks. We are trying very hard and it's really good to know that you like it". Besides,
Wilf's wife notes that many of you are ladies! So please don't stop!! |
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House FOR SALE... TWO HOLIDAY VILLAS... |
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FERRY SERVICES |
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Moving to Crete - Practical Advice.. An e-mail copy is available as a Microsoft word file - a very fast email of very useful information. |
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Out and about in April |
Earthquakes. Wobbling Still.....but only a bit! Earthquake activity in Greece continues as usual.
Three reports for April:-
A Little Extra news... April is the month when Crete generally gives itself a shake and gets ready for summer. The winter rugs and mats get a thrashing and an airing before being put away, the wood-burning stoves and their flues are dismantled, and everywhere in the villages can be heard the ‘slip-slop’ of whitewash. Walls and steps get a thorough coating – sometimes the road gets a liberal application too. Quite often an ordinary sweeping brush and a wheelbarrow are used, so not a lot of finesse is possible. Most noticeable of all, of course, is the change in the tourist areas. The coast road between Kolimbari and Chania undergoes a complete transformation in a very short period. Building sites turn overnight into new hotels and apartments as the final paint is applied and the furniture arrives on the back of a lorry. Palm trees are craned into position and held upright by temporary stays, new signs go up and swimming pools are filled. The summer supermarkets and tourist shops which have had their windows papered over since the end of October are furiously restocking with lilos, suncream, local pottery and crates of beer. The tavernas repaint their tables and chairs with this season’s colour – yet another shade of blue – and the all-nations picture menus go up outside, offering hundreds of versions of luridly-coloured moussaka or stuffed tomatoes (with or without chips). So much activity – surely it will never all be ready in time? But this is Greece. Remember the fuss over whether or not last year’s venues for the Olympics would be completed on schedule? They may have been on the last minute, but they got it finished – and so it is here. After all, it ‘s been done many times before. By the time the first of the charter flights arrive in Chania at the beginning of May, calm will be restored. If those early holidaymakers only knew the work that has gone in on their behalf……. |
In the News... Missing Greek ship found...
Scheduled flights from London... Direct scheduled flights from London to Heraklion are due to start on May 3... Link to story. More news from the area .. Link
story.
Have you read The Angel Tree by Alex Dingwall-Main? No? Why not? We reviewed it a couple of months ago on this page (see link below). In the book, A-D-M spends a lot of time - and his client's money - trying to find the oldest olive tree in existence. He doesn't, of course, because we all know where it is, don't we? I thought it might be fun if we all tried to find it for him ... and here's my contender: Click picture to enlarge. How about sending in a picture on any other really old-looking olive trees that you know about? One that will make the one above look like a twig-in-arms? We look forward to seeing them - and, who knows, Alex Dingwall-Main might have to write a sequel to 'The Angel Tree'. |
Book Reviews. The
Cretan Vista Calendar Photos - Birds. |
Book Review News.
Best Books..
We will be updating the appearance of this page too fairly soon - particularly
the Icons
leading directly to the bookshelves (maybe prettier than the ones above!) and perhaps the current new
book review.
Only the books previously displayed on this page are below - the bookshelf links contain all current books.
'Who Pays The Ferryman'- Michael J. Bird All the best until then. Ann and Richard |