Month: April 2018

Ursula and Tony arrived at their house in France yesterday evening despite rough seas and abysmal weather. Rain was very much evident making driving hazardous. They will continue their journey to Italy to catch the ferry to Patras. Ursula is not keen on driving long distances so she has planned a series of étapes: both Tony…

Maria is now back in charge of the reception although I seem to have spent quite a bit of time here today. Firstly to show her where all the money came from as she is unaware of the existence of the spreadsheet I’ve been using since the paper booking-in sheets ran out. Apparently, her brother…

I’m not sure if Maria has arrived at the camping yet but I don’t see her car or hear her voice. I’ve just come back from reception waiting for the Swedish girls to come back from Paleochora having visited the ATM. I told them I’d come looking for them once I’d walked the dogs but…

Following a couple of days scrambling about with network cables and cameras, I felt it was time for a bit of a rest. Added to that, Xanthippos took the ladder to paint the kitchen. How far he got with it I have no idea. No ladder, no climbing on roofs etc. The morning and evening…

After yesterday’s activity, I wasn’t much up for something similar. Running seemed harder than usual and the 5km seemed to go on forever! I did a few things before going for a morning shower. I took down my WiFi access point from the corner of the storeroom as it seemed to be benefitting others more than…

The top temperature today is 33.3 recorded at 15:27. It has certainly been warm as I’ve clambered over the flat roof of the reception building installing a cable for the new camera which looks towards the entrance of the camping. I was woken up early by a barking dog so decided to get up anyway.…

Another load of washing went into the machine at around 05:45 and was ready when I came back from walking the dogs. It was still as we walked out and there were even some stars. No sign of the moon as it’s much too early in the month. We walked and I ran, with Fido…

It was a little busy this morning with the typical Monday morning rush. Mostly to do with Inter Sport and the ever-disconnecting S Drive. I’d been to Paleochora to the dentist to see what time they opened today. Not for myself but for one of the customers suffering from a tooth infection. Then to the…

I understand the surprise Eleanor un-birthday party went well. No wind this morning but still a bit of a nip in the air following yesterday’s northerly wind. I ran in a light fleece and a T-shirt. I completed the World Day challenge which involved any workout of 30 minutes or more. Considering I run for…

I was up around 03:30 to close the awning tent as I’d left the door open and the wind was quite strong. The fastest gust of the day was over 80km/h Bft 9. I didn’t rush to get up and went down to see how the two women with the three children were getting on.…

As much as the person staying for three days didn’t arrive, the two women with their three children did arrive but at 18:45. They had driven from Rethymno so are excused on grounds of distance. Arriving at Dog Walking Time is inconvenient, especially so when you don’t have a tent as expected. Unfortunately, the tent…

  Today the high at Grammeno was 27.1C and at Lewes it was 27.2C making Lewes warmer than Grammeno by 0.1C. Ursula reported that today was the warmest UK April day for the past seventy years. At least summer in UK is over for another year so you can put away the sunscreen and the factor…

Unlike the most recent mornings, it was chilly so I wondered if perhaps I should have put on a fleece. The sky was clear so I was able to see by the time we got out onto the stony beach road by the kantina. Speaking of which, Georgia has just confirmed that Kostas, who ran…

No wind this morning but cooler than yesterday when the alarm sounded at 05:45. No barking in the night from Princess which was a bit of a bonus. Luis declined to join us on the morning walk then proceeded to make a fuss for having been left behind. He’s been a bit sluggish getting up…

The alarm went off a little earlier this morning but I was awake anyway. Dawn is earlier on a clear day so it seems a good plan to be up to see it. Today, it was not a clear day, rather overcast and dismal but not cold. I was running without a T-shirt after the…

It’s 21:05 and I’m just starting to write this. I don’t know where the day has gone and why I have not completed any of the tasks I’d set myself. After the early activities, I went to see the PAWS puppies as I didn’t really need anything from the supermarket. Mr Petrakis senior was sitting…

The morning walk was at 05:00 as I had to be ready to leave at 06:00 to bring Sasha’s car back from the airport. We left on time and enjoyed a gentile drive through the mountains. Poor Zora had the aeroplane to look forward to so no need to be throwing up in the first…

We now have faster Internet in the camping. Georgia signed up for 50Mbps Internet which is currently the fastest available here in Kountoura. It’s certainly a great improvement of 3-4Mbps we had previously. The nice Cosmote man came to check out the router and kindly reset it to factory default. Fine under domestic conditions but…

Yesterday we were empty. Today we have three motorhomes. One is a Frenchman and his who is carrying out research for a group holiday next May. He reckons there will be around 35 people with 15 vans. He wants his group to go to the Samaria Gorge and for the camping to take control of…

I have managed not to have to build a database during my IT career but now the time has probably come to learn to make one. I have been looking into it today and it’s complicated however I should really get my head around it. This new EU legislation called GDPR means that companies have…

Obi joined us as we passed through the gate from the field to the stony beach. Where he was all night I have little idea although I have a report from the German couple that he was trying to snuggle up to them when she came back from a trip to the loo in the…

I have just returned from my first meal at Houmas restaurant for 2018. Last Friday morning I stopped by the restaurant to see if it would be open that evening as Janne and Erica wanted to take me out for a meal. Nikos said that he would open on Monday. So today we went along…

Easter Day was sunny and warm: the hottest day of the year so far with a high of 25.2C. It started slightly earlier than usual as Janne and Erica were packing up the final bits and pieces before departure. We said goodbye and I want out to walk the dogs. The walk was uneventful as…

During the night there was 3.3mm of rain around 01:00. It started to rain again as I was about to get out of bed so I stayed there. The rain continued for about 30 minutes and then I got up to take the dogs. Everything was nicely wet outside. The walk was dry which is…

Since the beginning of January, when Georgia came back from spending New Year in Athens, Mickey has been living in Chania. He returned today, much to the delight of Πέντε who has been missing him. She is doubly pleased because Lau started his journey back to Holland the day before yesterday meaning no more sausages…

Some Austrian friends arrived this evening. The sound of barking alerted me to some intruders on the camping so I went down to investigate. There I found my friends who’d emailed a week ago to say they would be coming to the camping at Easter. This time they are driving a large 4×4 car but…

Xanthippos was telling me, and anyone else who cared to listen, that he feels unappreciated, especially as far as Georgia is concerned. He has worked very hard, together with Mikhalis, to make the camping look good. Several customers have told me how tidy the camping is looking, however, Xanthippos feels that Georgia is unappreciative of…

Steven Bochco, the creator of Hill Street Blues, NYPD Blues and LA Law, died on 1 April aged 74. Bochco was responsible for introducing more realism into TV drama and his influence can be seen in The Wire, which I am presently watching. He tried to convey the mix of police work together with the…

Watching the penultimate episode of season one of The Wire, an American cop drama centred around drug gangs in Baltimore. All the dogs started to bark so I went outside to admonish them and to see what was going on. Some of the Albanians had brought a couple who wanted to stay the night, to…

A rude awakening at 05:25 by Princess barking at something outside the compound. Probably some creature in the long grass or perhaps she just wanted to bark for no reason. I was awake so didn’t bother going back to sleep for only another twenty minutes or so. Princess was attached to a tree when I…