Limping Down the Road Again!



"Not with these knees!"

Here is the retrospective on stuff other than the Greek Crisis that has engaged Greyrocks since landing in Heraklion after dark on 17th June. We had booked in to a hotel close to what is known as Bus Station B and spent the evening in its top floor bar wallowing in cheap(ish) Greek wine, Greek traffic noise and Greek summer night weather. How different from Bristol! Next morning somehow Ruth and the wheelie bags were steered to the bus which was going all the way to Matala and was initially almost empty save for a dozen Matala-type folk a third of our age! The hotel in Matala itself had been booked for almost a year, but to start from Friday - not Thursday, so the plan was to get off early in Pitsidia, which we remember as a mellow and genuinely alternative small village. We had a room booked but little idea where it was. The town of Moires has little to commend it, but it is a major bus junction. We arrived there with a double seat each and the glow of believing coming a day early was very wise. A few festival-bound Italians got on, we waited and a bus arrived with another bunch of assorted nationality from Agia Galini . Some had to stand! Then after another wait another bus (from Rethymnon) arrived and dozens more travellers with tents, cool boxes, all manner of musical instruments, dreadlocks,  bed rolls, etc! Greyrocks slunk into window seats and speculated about how we would ever get out and be united with our luggage in Pitsidia given the state of Ruth's knees; but we did and went straight to the bus-stop kafenion for a much needed beer or two. (It ad been almost three hours!) It emerged that our room was not at all nearby and that no taxi driver could or would get us there so the nice owner came out and got us! Highly recommended for an inland stay - if you have a car! We hobbled to the only real option for a meal and next day were given a lift all the way to our Matala hotel, where we were greeted effusively and given a small but beautifully appointed room, (which we were told we could also have had the previous night if we had asked!)

This was the fifth Matala Festival and Greyrocks has been at them all. Its reputation has spread and it is widely advertised. It has been run by a variety of set-ups and the flavour evolves, so that it is now a BEACH festival, rather than a HIPPIE Revival one. This has changed the line-up from bands playing old stuff to anyone that will come! Tribute bans are still there: this year The Doors and Pink Floyd as before, and a brilliant solo Italian Neil Young who was on the village square stage, but the rest was not really what Greyrocks wanted: especially the Saturday night offering  - as last year of Tonis Sfinos whose vast popularity with Greeks of all ages remains a complete mystery! It was good to see a number of new Greek bands who could rock if not with anything remarkable in their repertoire!

There were far fewer street stalls this time and it is starting to become difficult to know where to eat and drink as at peak times there simply isn't the capacity. A further disappointment came when we met up with the Kalyves crowd (which grows exponentially by the year) at The Lions and found Giorgos the mellow waiter had moved on! After several litres of red wine we all came to the conclusion that it was being watered down, so the place lost its long-held status as viewing spot of choice! No good substitute has yet been found! Also as a would-be feminist hippie Ruth finds the interpretation of "flower power" as bands of tarty made-up schoolgirls in bikinis with a bit of body-paint and a commercial artificial garland doing "selfies" a bit galling - but, hey!- that's grumpy old woman for you!


This ATM or the whole nation?

But this was Greyrocks' first couple of days in Greece for the season so it was time to chill out! There is one ATM in Matala so we thought we would pay a casual visit on Friday before it got busy. This is what we found! Not a panic for Greyrocks but the idea of three days of many thousands of visitors and no cash to be spent was
grim. The mayor, or whoever must have thought so too, as relief was soon there in the form of a G4 van, and it kept coming for the weekend! Ruth queued up soon after the first replenishment with German-speakers and forgetting all about "Peace and Love" sounded off about whose fault it all was! Not Greyrocks' finest moment and she was duly rebuked for lack of karma!

On Monday morning tight plans were made for an early arrival at the bus stop to guarantee a seat for the long journey back to Heraklion. These were thwarted by a change of buses at the last minute and Bob had to grovel to join Ruth on the over-crowded bus! That was his karma rather poked for a couple of hours! (And a Greyrocks decision that we are too old for this Malarkey and will definitely bring the car next year!)

We took a cab back to Bus Station A and a bus to Chania passing through some cloud then stayed overnight in a central Chania hotel. Our diligent reader will know that getting a Chinese meal in the city is a treat which has given grief in the past (see last year in particular) but we were sure we knew what to do this time! It has closed! What is the problem??
So we ended up in a very nice place and R enjoyed a perfect kleftiko instead!
Next morning we toured the bike shops of Chania in search of a cheap or second-hand bike for Ruth and failed; but we got the midday bus and although it stopped at every pile of goat dung we did eventually make it to our little paradise of Paleo!