Mytikas

We left our gorgeous hill town and headed towards the coast. Mountains rose spectacularly around us.

It was a longish drive so we tried to find somewhere for lunch in the small towns we were passing through. The first taverna we tried had open doors and an old couple sitting inside but we were clearly told it wasn't open. The old couple were presumably family just hanging out there. 

We drove through the next small town and spotted people sitting at tables behind a plastic wind protection blind so we pulled up. The place had no sign or name and we realised it was all men seated there, which meant it was a cafe, not a restaurant. Cafes don't always sell food, but we asked anyway. The lovely young woman was delighted to have us there and did her best to help. She offered us cheese, meatballs and the omnipresent Greek salad. We chose the meatballs and salad but the cheese got served up anyway - plus bread of course! 

We loved it here. It was all so laid back and very local. Two boys rode bicycles through the cafe non-stop and people didn't mind at all when the kids accidentally rode into their chairs or yelled with excitement. The people were so kind. 

We loved watching the seating protocol. Someone would walk in and there were no spare tables. They would cast their eyes around the place to see who was there, always stopping in surprise when they saw us. They would then decide who they would sit with and just walk up to that table and sit with the others and start talking. Of course, all these people know each other well but I love the way everyone isn't precious about who sits at their table.

I snuck this photo just to remember the place.

As we approached the mouth of the Gulf of Corinth, a huge, modern bridge loomed into sight.

Crossing it was awesome! The only bad part was that we had to pay a massive toll - 15 euros! - on the other side.

We arrived at our destination, the seaside town of Mytikas. Our airbnb host greeted us and she was absolutely lovely. Her English was great too which was a huge bonus! Our apartment was on the third floor. It was nothing flash but the view over the bay was magnificent!

We jumped in the water soon afterwards but it was a bit windy and the water was quite choppy. We soon learned that this was normal. In fact there were some nights where the wind was so strong that the whole apartment building rattled and banged.

Washing got hung on the line on the balcony and I had to anchor it down really well just to keep the clothing on the line. At best it hung horizontally. When the wind really picked up it hung upwards!

Sometimes the sea was glassy smooth though, usually in the mornings.

The little town was lovely with a fairly high percentage of tourists, both Greek and others, but in such a small town this still wasn't a lot of people.

We learned early that many Greeks from this area went to Australia. Many went to Melbourne but some, such as the Frangos' and Livitsanos', moved to Ballarat.  The father of a friend of ours came from this village while our friend's mum came from the next village up the hill. We met a few Aussies here who come back each year to stay in their family's village.

We got talking one night to some Aussies at the next table in a restaurant and the guy's family came from the next larger town further up the coast. Recently though, all his family, except his parents, had moved back there! He and his partner were thinking of doing the same. It makes sense that, after years of working and earning money, people would want to come back to the land of great food, endless sunshine and chilled attitude!

The town was reasonably modern but there were still a few older traditional homes around.

The area in front of most of the town was really just concrete edges with a few stony beaches but further along the coast, long, pebbly beaches stretched on for miles.

We got up early each day to exercise in an attempt to beat the heat. It was only just doable really. John had some good bike rides here. My favourite walk took me to a tiny church perched on the side of a hill. It was gorgeous! To enter, I had to duck down to get through the door which was about 120 cm high.

The church was built into a small cave and it all looked quite old, although it was obviously still in use. An old arch over the roof had collapsed, letting the light in.

I recognised this piece of equipment outside. It's a bbq for cooking souvlakis at church festivals!

Strangely, a water tank was positioned in a tree!

The views from outside the little church were superb.

Mytikas is perched right on the pointy peninsula in the photo below.

I then navigated to the Heroon of Alyzia. It's some sort of old tomb but I can find very little info about it. Alyzia is an ancient city around here.

Around the tomb were scattered carved rocks. Their purpose is completely unknown to me.

Another walk led me through the farmland behind the town. The lucerne crops were in their full vivid green glory.

One day, I was walking up a quiet country lane when I saw a man with a goat he had just butchered! He was in the process of hanging it in a tree.

These sheep came running up to me when I passed. They were obviously hoping I was bringing food. We saw lots of sheep in this area and a number of utes with milk cans in the back. These must be milking sheep. Greek feta is made with sheep milk and sooo much of it is eaten that there must be a lot of farmers making their livelihoods from milking sheep.

I was always wary of dogs when I was walking. House dogs are no problem but dogs that are left to protect farms when the owners live in town, or dogs that run with a mob of sheep to protect them, are a real concern. I always carry my walking stick just in case but haven't had any issues so far. John has had a few incidents though but, being on a bike, he can usually get away ok.

One day, John and I drove up to a village above Mytikas called Varnakas. John rode his bike from there and I walked up to the ruins of Varnakas Castle. Again, the views were amazing.
In this photo, I'm looking back towards Mytikas with the mountainous Kalamos Island in the background. There are quite a few of the Ionian islands quite close by.

All that was left of the castle were the walls. An olive grove had been planted inside it. Clearly this castle wasn't high on the list of preservation priorities! 

One thing about castles is that they're usually built in locations that offers big views so the inhabitants can see who's approaching. This one was no exception.

Our lovely host, Theodora, made homemade zucchini pie for us one day! She gave it to us straight out of the oven. It was wonderful!

One thing to do at Mytikas is rent little boats. They're not very big or very powerful, so you don't need a licence. The people who ran the boat rental place were lovely. The son had spent five years in Melbourne so we had a bit to talk about. 

We picked the day that we wanted to go by looking at the weather forecast. It was the right thing to do. We had perfect weather for the whole trip and the next day was a howling gale again!

At the arranged time we turned up, were literally given a five-minute lesson on how to drive the boat and we were off!

Kalamos Island is quite close to Mytikas. Tucked behind Kalamos is a smaller island called Kastos. These two islands would be our destinations for the day. With Captain Yiannis at the helm, we headed off. (John has pretty much adopted the Greek version of his name, lol).

We explored little coves and passed small towns. 

We soon learned that every time we thought we'd found a lovely little beach, a cluster of yachts had already beaten us to them, There were even a few fancy boats hiding in tiny bays. John later looked up the name of this boat to see where it was from. Apparently it's for sale - for 82.5 million euros!!!! Or for around a cool 1 million euros a week you can rent it, complete with its crew of 29 people!

Old, restored windmills stood scenically along the islands.

We visited Kastos Island first and decided that for us to say we had been there, we had to stand on it. We tried to pull into the main town but there was literally no places left to tie up the boat, so we left, a bit dejected about how busy these islands were. And it wasn't even the weekend! We finally found a teeny, tiny beach that we could get to that had nobody else on it. We put the anchor down but weren't sure if it would hold properly so I swam ashore first while John stayed on the boat.

Our little boat from the shore.

Then John swam ashore while I stayed on the boat. 

He found a bit of a cave to chill in.

Where there was a sandy bottom, the water was a stunning colour and crystal clear. We had snorkels and masks but there wasn't much to see.

At a point midway between the two islands, John stopped the boat and jumped in. That's very deep water, John!

By this stage, Captain Yiannis was looking very at home behind the wheel.

We moved onto Kalamos Island and nosed into a cove. To our surprise we found the ruins of an old castle!

We were not surprised though that we also found about a dozen yachts, including this lovely wooden one.

Our groovy little rental :) (the boat, not the captain).

Another scenic windmill.

The islands were quite green and had some cool rock formations.

We were still looking for a lovely beach to explore on our own. We finally found a string of gorgeous beaches but, again, heaps of yachts had beaten us to them. We went for second-best and pulled up at this very ordinary beach but it had a lovely old church on it.

Our boat looked tiny next to the yachts.

Our plan was to have a late lunch/early dinner at a restaurant on Kalamos Island. We got there earlier than planned though as we hadn't really found a beach to hang out on first. They found us a table under an umbrella and we had a wonderful meal. John's meal was really special - locally harvested prawns are a specialty and apparently they're fantastic!

A keepsake pic for John.

We crossed back to our town and cruised along the coast. This is our apartment. We're on the top floor with the green shutters.

Mytikas viewed from the sea.

On the very point of the Mytikas peninsula is a little restaurant that sells seafood. John loved this place. If you want fish, they open up some eskies and you choose what you would like. The fisherman owner then steps into the sea and scales and guts the fish. Birds and little fish hang around for the innards. It's all very entertaining. We ate here three nights out of our seven in Mytikas!

There was even crayfish one night.

Another night he had a tuna which he cut steaks to order.

Next door was a place that operated from early morning until late evening. All it sold was coffee, drinks and cakes and it was always busy. If the wind was blowing from the west, as it usually was, this was in a protected spot. It was lovely to just sit here and check out the boats going by while eating bougatsa or, a new favourite, galaktoboureko. Both of these are variations of a custard pie and they're both amazing!

Mytikas wasn't my favourite place but it was nice enough. Apologies to all those Aussie Greeks who came from here! I think the mainland beach towns have a very different feel to the island beach towns and I miss that island feel. The wind was a surprise. Apparently it's always like we experienced and in winter it's worse! In winter, the sea and rocks often end up on the main road. The road is behind the front row of buildings! Our lovely host, Theodora, had seen old photos of boats that had been washed up onto the main road in wild wind!

One thing we were grateful for though was just to be near the water when Greece is going through a heatwave. We could exercise early, jump in for a swim before the wind picked up then hang out in our apartment with the aircon on when the heat hit. I know this all sounds so crazy when it's so cold at home!

Cheers!
Heather and John (Yiannis)