Month: June 2018

Sophie’s last day on Crete as we are heading to the airport following a final meal at Anydri. Naturally, Ursula is beside herself with jealousy as she finds shopping on Sainsbury no substitute for a meal at Anydri! I was out early with the dogs as usual and went to Paleochora after my run. We…

At 04:00, my alarm kicked off the day. I wanted to get out early with the dogs as Sophie was catching the early bus to Omalos to walk down the Samaria Gorge. The bus should leave Paleochora at 06:15 but we were both ready to depart at 05:45 so off we went. There was not…

I only got around fours hours sleep due to going to bed a bit late and being woken up by Fido making silly noises. I decided to get up and take the dogs out for the morning walk. It was good today. Plenty of moon, not too much cloud and sufficient wind to keep the mozzies…

It is winter again as it rained just as I went to pick up Sophie from the bus station in Paleochora. We had a meal at the camping restaurant and then chatted under the awning. We both wore fleeces and it was too cold for the mosquitoes. It’s late so I’ll fill in more in…

Another thundery, rainy forecast crept up on us today. I checked on Sunday and the week ahead looked good. It was cooler this morning for the walk and then again when I went running. I was a little late going to Paleochora as I found Peter lurking outside my gate when I was leaving. He…

I put loads of washing in the machine this morning and it’s still hanging on the line. Too many other things have transpired to prevent me from folding up all the clothes although I have made my bed with lovely clean sheets. It will take ages for all of the various inmates to recover from…

After the excitement of the weekend, the camping is calming down. Cars are leaving and the car park is emptying. The sounds of excited children are diminishing and some tranquillity is returning. The group under the trees behind me are still here but I suspect they will be for a week or so. The buzz…

The Xanthippos birthday meal was good fun. The table looked a bit deserted to begin with but many of the guests were working so unable to join in until later. I arrived to find Xanthippos sitting at the head of a long table with loads of empty chairs. As time went on, they all filled…

Ursula, Tony and Heidi have just left for their visit to UK. They will be coming back to Grammeno on 4/5 September having survived the rigours of the (in)famous British Summer. It could be quite a shock to the system having recently spent so much time on Crete. They are catching the ferry from Souda…

We’ve had a wild night out at the camping restaurant with Georgia and Maria. The five of us, Georgia, Maria, Ursula, Tony and me have been stuffing our faces in the restaurant since 20:30. Georgia wasn’t satisfied until we’d tested every vegetable dish known to man. The kitchen staff must have been going crazy. Just…

The biggest event of the day is a slum clearance program for the awning area. Since the demise of my chair last night, the fabric has been removed from the frame which is now resting in the storeroom. I will decide what to do in due course. I still have one functioning LaFuma chair so all is…

At least Fido didn’t wake me up early this morning: that was left to the idiots with the automatic weapons firing off at 02:00! What is it with weddings which brings about all this shooting? Fido was quiet due to his collar, however, Luis made up for him. I was not up for getting out…

Fido decided to sing to us at 03:25 accompanied by Princess. I made my displeasure plain and so Fido has been wearing a collar ever since he was tied up for the night outside his house. This evening, despite a number of distant automatic weapon reports, he still didn’t bark. So fearful of the collar around…

Mikhalis was telling me that the forecast he looked at predicted heavy rain for today. Just guessing, I said that I expected only a few short showers. As it turned out, the forecast he heard was incorrect. There have been a few showers but certainly, nothing to get excited about. One such shower occurred when…

All the doom and gloom regarding torrents of wet weather, thunder and lightning etc came to very little. My preparations the previous night, as expected, guaranteed little or no rain. There were a couple of very brief showers yesterday evening and another, slightly more prolonged shower at 04:45, at dog walking time. As a consequence,…

To be sure of fine weather for the next few hours, I have gone round the awning tent to close it up. I will make doubly sure of no rain be even closing up the door! The forecast now warns of 9mm rain from around 23:00 tonight with a further 9mm during the following 24…

We can probably conclude that, following a virtually interrupted spell of fine, hot and sunny weather, we’re about to have a bit of a change. I’d decided that summer had arrived so moved the ‘inside’ dogs outside. Their cages are not really very waterproof so I may need to make alternative arrangements if the forecast…

Antonis was doing some work for Janne next door so dropped by to talk about my replacement awing and van roof. The plan now is to cover the entire van as well as the decking. The van will have a metal frame constructed above it which will support sheets of corrugated metal to take the…

It wasn’t the hottest day of the year so far as that was on June 3 when it was 37.4C. Today was by no means cold as it was just over 30C when I set off for Paleochora around 09:00. You might think that it would be hot cycling when it’s so warm however there…

Of course you all know that a macro is used to automate a task on a computer. I am trying to learn how to write macros in VBA which is a language used to write code in Microsoft applications. The aim is to automate repetitive tasks such as making up 800 email addresses which are…

Lots of early activity followed by lots of inactivity. We took the dogs to the Promontory where it was blowing quite hard. I was wearing shorts and a polo shirt and was just about warm enough despite the cool westerly wind. The morning exercises followed the walk with Ursula amusing the dogs with her floorshow…

Following several weeks of warm, sunny weather, it’s turned windy and cooler. A pity, as the camping is quite busy. They say it never rains but it pours. Fanis, Eleni and Dimitra arrived last night and today Ingo, Silvia and Kalliope. I spent some while on the beach with Eleni as she is interested in…

The evening walk is normally to the top of the Promontory and back, however, we are currently restricted to a quick run along the east, stony beach. This evening two guys in a car drove by as we were walking along. Princess became extremely animated and was very keen to meet the guy who got…

For the second time, Ursula, Tony and Steffi set off to meet Janne, Erica and me at a restaurant for a meal out. We went somewhere Erica and Janne had taken me previously and where Ursula and Tony had visited before. The restaurant is located in Paleochora, not in the centre but nearer to the…

Erica and Janne returned from Gavdos this evening. After a brief conversation, as we were about to walk the dogs, they say that the island wasn’t too busy and there are mostly small communities spread out all over. It was worth the visit. Ursula and I took the dogs east onto the stony beach this…

Despite having one or two other things to do, I managed a meeting with Georgia. We met in the office where Maria was duty receptionist. Our first discussion was about all the dogs. Not just mine but hers too. There is new legislation regarding dogs pertaining to keeping up to date with their injections and…

I have finally managed to get my other website working again. It has not been working for some time mostly since the Meteobridge device, which records and sends out all the weather data, had a bit of a moment and I lost all its settings. I then discovered that my last backup was older than…

We didn’t go on an evening walk yesterday because Georgia and Maria were lurking next door and would have spotted us sneaking out the back of the camping. Better to keep these little secrets for as long as possible. Tonight, following another hot day with a high of 37.3C, we toyed with the idea of abandoning…

The plan had always been for Steffi to come to eat at Anydri with Ursula, Tony and I. As a family, they tend to go to the same restaurants or eat at home. I’d suggested in the past that The Schoolhouse might make a nice change from some of the Paleochora restaurants. Steffi is on…

A 4×4 was attempting to bypass the most recent boulder blockade yesterday morning as we walked through the dark towards the Promontory. Kostas was driving his black 4×4 endeavouring to fid a way through. Today he managed to deliver a selection of black plastic pipe which he deposited in the usual space. I actually spoke…