As Kerry mentioned in the last blog post, we are still at Preveza Marina and have handed back the hire car so it’s ‘on yer bike’! Fortunately we have discovered some excellent cycling lanes going about 15km north along the coast to some amazing beaches. We are enjoying cycling just like we used to do in the early 90’s, when we used to do a lot of cycle touring around Cambridgeshire. The roads here are surprisingly quiet once you have diced with death getting out of the town and the cycle lanes are a dream. They have just been made and are super smooth. In fact some were still being made as we cycled on them! The down side is that some of the local car drivers and motorcyclists have found their way onto the cycle lanes as well so you need to be alert for the unexpected!
We have cycled three times to our favourite beach (Monolithi) about 15km away. It’s a very, very long beach, but you can stop anywhere and the sea is clear and refreshing. Probably ideal for long distance swimming but I’m perhaps lacking a bit of motivation for this since the snorkelling is so good.
It was not all smooth cycling in paradise. Occasionally the unexpected happens. On one of the hottest days I suggested a cycle to the supermarket, via the museum. We had been to the museum before and I was actually not that excited about it (once you have seen one broken piece of pottery the rest looks quite similar), but I had a different motivation. It had air conditioning! Anything that was cooler than a hot boat in a marina sounded attractive to me. So we set off determinedly on the bikes, but barely got out of town before I heard a crashing sound behind me. Not good. I almost did not want to turn around and see what was once Kerry and now strawberry jam on the road, but I sort of had to.
She scraped herself up surprisingly quickly, wiped herself down and said ‘I’m fine’. Maybe I was slightly in shock myself and I was concerned about the blood, so I strongly suggested returning to the boat for the first aid kit. She actually took some persuading but we did turn around, got her grazed elbow cleaned up and put one of our fancy plasters on it. In fact I got the first plaster the sticky side up somehow (so it stuck to me rather than her), so had to bin it. Very upsetting as they were not cheap.
To explain the crash. Kerry was following me over a kerb as we crossed a side road. My bike is light at the front and I can simply jump it over small kerbs without thinking much about it. Kerry’s bike is heavy at the front as it has its battery, motor and cycle bag, with all her stuff in it. It will not jump a kerb. It rather follows the kerb, like a train would follow a train track. Therefore her bike tried to go one direction, while she went in a different one, hence the crash. A sort of law of physics thing, but I’m not sure which one.
It was so hot in Barberry today (27th June) that we could not face staying inside, even with fans blowing in our faces at full blast. We have retreated to Celest, our marina cafe, to enjoy some air conditioning. The last straw was finding a pigeon that was also too hot and seeking shade in our cockpit. I didn’t think I would get close to him, but he was clearly in distress (although I can’t really read bird facial expressions that well), so I fed him some water. He actually drank about two capfuls.
I did try him with some biscuits, but I just could not get him the take them. I thought maybe they were not his flavour, but Kerry had the cheek to suggest that he would not eat them because they were stolen biscuits. True enough, I had stolen them, but how would a bird know this?
We have lift out in a couple days and then our flight home. It’s been a great couple of months. Kerry will bring you up the date with final packing up process and transition to the Irish summer!