Day 8 (Monday, May 18):
Today we left at 7:50am from Mystras, so we all had to rise early to be ready. Luckily it is so gorgeous and sunny and warm that this is not as much of a pain as it is in Bozeman, Montana. I gorged on the greek yogurt; mixing it with both honey and fig jam – yum!! And again, the ham and swiss (?) cheese, with hard boiled egg, kalamata olives, orange juice and cheese. Yesterday, peeling and eating the hard boiled egg that came in the little cup was, um, well, lets say challenging. I did much better today :) I was totally overstuffed, but oh my was it good!.
As we waited for the buses, I was expecting a traditional city bus. Slightly run-down, dirty, filled with smelly people. Greece overall is much dirtier and run-down than I had expected (Abe, not the use of the hyphen, lol :) ). So, I wasn't expecting much. But, of course, what pulls up is no run-of-the-mill bus; rather, it is an extremely nice large bus! The kind of really nice tour bus you see around. Long, sleek, air-conditioned, plush seats. I took a video, it was pretty ridiculous.
The bus ride through the countryside was uneventful. We went first from Mystras to Sparta, then transferred to another bus, rode to Tripoli, transferred again, and went to Napflio. We considered ourselves lucky to have everyone make every bus.
Nafplio is a very quaint town. It feels much more Italian, more Mediterranean that Athens. It still has its feral animals (which seem to be everywhere), but there are differences in architecture. Here, there are a lot more colonial style houses, and more “big-box” style buildings, with more square decorations and multi-colors, whereas in Athens there were a lot more small, narrow, (tall) buildings.
The main highlight of the day was the Italian Gelato Shop!!! Oh. My. It was, hands down, THE BEST ICE CREAM/ GELLATO EVER. PERIOD. Oh. My. Goodness. Paula and I were wandering around, and happened upon it. You wander in and are overtaken the the decorations. There is fruit and wine and flavoring and biscotti everywhere. Then, this middle-aged Italian man came up to us and gave us samples of the daily special. We were going to get one and split it... but it was just so good we each got our own. Oh, soooo gooooddd....!!!
I got a bowl with coconut (divine!), plum (amazing!!), chocolate with chiles (yum!!), and pineapple. All this absolute deliciousness was topped with the best homemade whipped cream I've ever had, a cherry, pieces of homemade ice-cream cone, and some yummy syrup. We were invited to sit, and were brought water and as soon as I had my first bite, well, lets just say I am CONVINCED that this gelato shop will be in heaven. I only wish I had the words to truly describe it. I decided I can no longer eat gelato on this trip after that. It would only be an insult.
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mmmm, gellato. Your description is so scintillating that I'm afraid I have an unquenchable desire for a food which is thousands of miles out of reach! Crap. Not good.
ReplyDeleteThis is my favorite blog entry so far. I love how you compare the various traits of the places you've been in Greece and talk about how you've noticed different building styles.
It's interesting, too, to see the evolution of your perspective on Greece. I'm assuming you've written these entries (to some extent) along the way? Cause it seems like in your first entries you were a lot more infatuated with Greece as a new place, and now you're starting to look at Greece with more balanced perspective. You seem to see more and more what is good about Greece, AND what is not so great.
What I find interesting about the pictures that you've taken is that the reality of sight-seeing ruins seems a little different than I have always imagined it would be. The beauty of Greece seems (from your pictures) to be in the current surviving architecture and landscape more so than the ruins. I don't know, I can't wait to talk to you more in person about this. :)