Last leg

Kai and Becky caught half a dozen fish in Xerokampos.

They were too small to cook and we had no vegetables to make fish soup, so the fish were reprieved and released on Thursday morning before we left to motor up to Pandeli.

Pandeli was very crowded, with a lot of big Turkish motor yachts. We managed to anchor on the sand just off the beach, but then found ourselves swinging onto a big mooring buoy. When we tried to anchor further out there was very little room and a lot of weed, so we decided it would be much nicer to go back to Lakki and anchor off the town beach.
On Friday morning we moved into the marina. Friday was mostly tidying up and packing. Becky and Andrew took Charlie to Crithoni's Paradise, where he revelled in the water, but they forgot to take armbands and camera. In the afternoon Charlie went to the town beach with Lin and Simon.

In the evening Becky and Andrew went out for a romantic dinner/blow-out at To Petrino, while Lin and Simon gave Kai and Charlie cheesy rice and had scrambled egg themselves.

On Saturday we hired a car for the day - it hardly costs any more to hire a car for 24 hours than it does to get a taxi to the aiport. We drove around the island heights for Kai to get a bird's eye (paratrooper's eye) view of the wartime battlefields and then visited the very moving war cemetery at Alinda, which brought Kai's heroic-romantic view of war somewhat, but probably only temporarily, down to earth.

We then went to Crithoni's for the rest of the day, interrupted by an excellent lunch at To Steki in Alinda

and a drive up to the castle after lunch.

 

Kai and Charlie had a great time in the pool at Crithoni's Paradise.

On Saturday night we had a quick pizza. Kai had been promised a night in the hammock, but the dew was so heavy that he and Andrew could not even sleep in the cockpit, but had to sleep below.

On Saturday morning Kai and Andrew, Kai and Charlie and Simon set off to the airport to take the early flight to Athens, which gave them six hours in the city before they had to take their flights to Birmingham. Having checked our bags in we took a taxi to the acropolis. With so many disabled in our party we were able to get value for the huge money of our tickets by going up in the so-called elevator - a very perilous looking device. By the time he got to the top Kai had huge blisters so could not walk in his shoes, but the stone was so hot that he could not walk without them either.

We had to abandon our plans to go to the Acropolis Museum and instead went down to have lunch in a favourite taverna at the top of Plaka before buying Kai some shoes in the flee market.

Now that Kai had shoes, tourism could resume. We went to see the Agora and the Stoa, but no sooner had we gone into the Stoa than we were thrown out - it was closing time. Charlie was tired and thirsty, Kai was moaning and we were all very hot - it was in the high thirties - so we had a drink in a cafe, where the waiter's mother had come from Birmingham to marry his Greek father.

We took the metro back to the airport, trying to distract other passengers from the smell rising from Charlie's nappy. Washed and changed and with a new pair of clean designer shorts bought at the airport Charlie had a great time in the children's area before we all had to board our planes and fly home (Simon was coming back via Munich, the others via Frankfurt). We all arrived in Birmingham together and Andrew's Uncle Andy picked us up and drove us home.
Simon now has two days of doctors and hospitals before flying back on Wednesday morning, all being well, while Lin cleans, tidies and chills in Lakki.