The Socratic Method

We left Crete two weeks ago and it's been a packed fortnight of travel, health maintenance, and even some socializing.

Kisses from Kissamos

Our Kissamos hosts treated us like family and we got hugged before taking a short taxi ride to the ferry port. The hubbie, who we chatted with for a grand total of 7 minutes, said I was like a brother to him and was pained that we didn't get to have wine together before we left. Cretans have a well-earned reputation for this over-the-top hospitality.

The somewhat wavy seven hour ferry ride offered great views of the edge of Crete and a couple other islands. As Sam says, the slow ferries are like hours of zen when you can sit outside, feel the wind, and watch the stunning coastline. The ferry stopped at Antikythera, official population 20(!) before reaching our stop, Githio, in the Peloponnese. Githio, when approached from the sea, looks like a European movie set. Colorful houses and shops snuggle the small port. I've lost count of the number of pension balconies we've been reluctant to leave because of the view; Githio had yet another paralyzing spot. Other than me accidently stepping into and shattering a Greek amphora-like flower pot (opa!), we had a nice stopover. Public transit between Gythio and Kalamata isn't easy so we hired a driver to take us on the spectacular coastal route to our temporary home until the end of August.

Kalamata Underwhelms

Arrival in Kalamata felt like a letdown after two months on Crete and a lovely first day on the Peloponnese. It's a functional city and has many features we desire in Greece (shaded walking, a bike network(!), polite drivers, and logical grid layout) but somehow it just doesn't feel like a possible home. Maybe it's the polite but serious locals who suffer by comparison to the falstaffian Cretans? Or the college flashback apartment we've rented? Or maybe it's that we had planned a less than fun, but necessary, health procedure?

Colonoscopy is a Greek Word

While on Crete we decided it might be time to get our pandemic-delayed first colonoscopies. But how do you research procedures like this in a foreign land? Not long after deciding to do this, we came across an American couple’s blog. Jackie and Joel live near Kalamata and mentioned that they had recently done this very thing...in Kalamata! Crazy good luck for us! I emailed them and Jackie kindly gave us even more details about their experience. I recommend reading Jackie's great write-up about Greek healthcare including their experience in Kalamata which parallels our own. Having their information was the reassurance we needed to go through with it and things went fine. And how often is your doctor's name Socrates?

We’re in the Mani

Freed from the medical portion of our calendar, we decided to hightail it out of Kalamata and explore the Mani peninsula, about an hour away by bus. Our first stop was Agios Nikolaos, the coastal town where Jackie and Joel live. In classic Greek style, our big bus pulled into the ridiculously tiny, narrow village center; it felt like squeezing a whale into a fishbowl but it amazingly works on these tiny roads. In much of the Mani, buildings are attractive stone structures. Greek cities often consist of dull housing so it was eye candy to see attractive architecture. And our balcony view here felt paralyzing, too! But we pried ourselves away to meet Jackie and Joel in person.

We spent several hours with them over two days and they generously shared the pros and cons of their lives here--luckily it's mostly pros! And after we spent two days in Ag Nik, it's now a place we're intrigued by, too. Ag Nik is beautiful, quaint, and has surprisingly good restaurants (many of which stay open even in winter) for such a small place. The swimming at Gnospi--which is more of a concrete pad rather than a beach--is one of the most breathtaking settings I can remember. Ag Nik has one of the nicest shared use paths we’ve seen in Greece; and it leads to the next town over, Stoupa.

We also struck up a friendship with one of the hosts at our pension. Turns out her dad, who built the hotel 40 years ago, is from Ioannina where we spent 3 months in lockdown in spring 2020. Sadly his story is similar to that of a book I started (but have yet to finish--it's tragic) called Eleni by Nicholas Gage. Our host was surprised by our knowing about the book and about Ioannina. Shortly after learning about this, she disappeared into the pension and brought out 3 books. At first I thought it was the Gage book but we learned she wrote a trilogy about her orphaned father's life during the Greek civil war. She's an attorney and has also written a book to assist women experiencing domestic abuse. And aside from all this she was sweet enough to personally drive us to our next stop, Stoupa. Our friends here often say that Greeks aren’t necessarily nice to other Greeks, but they can be incredibly nice to foreigners.

While Ag Nik is lowkey, the beaches and main drag in Stoupa are hectic and packed with tourists seeking sunburns. It's not our scene but luckily our room was away from the beachfront, down a pretty rabbit warren of a road. Despite the filled beaches it was still a pleasant stop. A few good restaurants certainly help.

This afternoon we hired a driver to take us from Stoupa to nearby Kardamili. After a couple nights here it's back to Kalamata to do laundry and then we’ll catch a bus to Nafplio where we'll get to see a play by Sophocles at the ancient theater of Epidaurus. And maybe we'll be lucky enough to have another excellent balcony view?