THE ROAD TO GLISTERI

The weather is still great, so I dropped Bas at the studio and commenced the downhill drive to Glisteri. As you can see from the photo above it was not a smooth ride. The bob cat was broken; the bob cat driver convinced a car (two in front of me) to drive past on his left; that car got stuck; the young Greek woman in the car in front of me (blue one in photo) catapulted out of her car and gave the bob cat driver what for; he froze in some sort of paralysis at her words and didn't move; she then headed back up the hill behind me, found the road gang, gave them what for but rather than paralyse them, she galvanised them towards the bob cat and they attempted to start it via its rear motor. After about 10 attempts it chugged into life, was moved to the side of the road and everyone rejoiced and were friends again!

The hill view photo shows the beach at the bottom of the hill. The photo with my toes in it shows that it was worth the drive. I headed back up to the studio to collect Bas for the afternoon beach shift and as you can see he is beginning to look more Greek. We had lunch at the beach side taverna, and read and swam for a couple of hours. We're back at the studio now and I'm about to trust my hair to a Russian hairdresser who now has the salon I visited last time.

CAR GOOD

The bottom photo is of Kastani Beach (of Mamma Mia fame) but it was fabulously quiet today and the water was pretty perfect even for our tropical bodies. It's warm so we did not do too much sunning. The lunch taverna was at nearby Panormos, where we had a 3pm feed post-swim. It deserves another visit. The top photo is of the beach below the studio and taken today- it's one of those blue, blue days.

We are back at the studio, Bas is working on another colour. Art coming along nicely.

Hard at Work

You can see the artist at work in the studio. It's Sunday and our world started with 60 or so loud bell rings at 7am and a blackout akin to a Darwin outage. We deduced from the neighbours that "someone was working on it" and our power, hot water and coffee was soon flowing.

Our excitement today has been hiring a little car for the week, so I/we can get about a bit more particularly if we are lucky enough to keep this good beach weather. So, we have lurched up the steep hill on a narrow road to the studio and Bas will 'put a colour' down before we head to a beach.

We've spoken to Robbie and Jack and both seem in good spirits- it's really going to be a little by little journey for Robbie. My phone is not working as a phone in Greece but texting seems to be OK. Sorry, I have not responded to many blog comments- I just discovered that function this morning so will work on replying if any comments come through!

We found the donkey and a bad parrot

The top photo is the view from our bedroom. We went up, up, up the hill for an 8pm dinner at ‘the great view’. Gloria, Jill and 3 year old multilingual Zoe welcomed us and we were in the wonderful vegetable garden as Giogos plucked fresh items off the various vines for immediate cooking. He had also procured fresh whole fish which pretty much melted in the mouth and his fresh zucchinis did likewise.

We left at 10.30pmish to head down, down, down the hill. In the meantime we had posted the Bells’ Angels blog via wireless in the vegetable garden at the edge of ‘the great view’. We had also given some Aussie presents- for Gloria and Jill Geographic Shop Aussie soaps. For Giogos, a small stuffed Geographic Shop kookaburra, and for Zoe a small stuffed Geographic Shop parrot, which they loved and immediately named respectively Basil and Marj in our honour. Interestingly, while Zoe clung to the parrot she declared it to be a ‘bad’ parrot.

Next morning, Thursday 11 June, Bas headed up the hill to the studio and I noticed two missed calls from Jack on my mobile. My phone just cut out when I called him or he called me. We could text, however. I headed down to town to find better reception and/or a public phone. Whatever he wanted to tell me he did not want to do by text. About 2 hours later I gave up on my phone and sent a text to Bas (at the top of the hill) to ring Jack. The text back translated as ‘fire in Robbie’s flat, she’s in intensive care, lots of family in attendance’. So at about the same time on Wednesday night that we were in heaven on earth, Robbie in Australia was not.

At 3am-ish in Australia her room in her flat caught on fire. It was started by an electric heater. There is an article at: http://www.smh.com.au/national/80-people-evacuated-in-elizabeth-bay-apartment-block-fire-20090611-c3w3.html which was written at the time. It’s a very scary photo.

She and Joel were admitted to St. Vincent’s. They are both OK physically but will obviously need time to deal with the broader issues. Our sister-in-law Ruth received a 3am call (as Rob’s next of kin nominee while her parents are overseas) to allow anaesthetic to be administered and soon after other sisters/sisters in law, Libby and Janice, drove to Sydney from Canberra. Jack and his girlfriend Yvette hopped on a plane from Melbourne and Rob’s and Joel’s friend network in Sydney kicked in. Peter Hall and family, and extended others all rallied. Pretty wonderful response. Our studio friends here have also been great and we’ve been able to talk to Ruth, Robbie, bedside nurses and others through Skype.

We of course have been in a dilemma about whether to stay here or head back home. Robbie today said to stay here and we’ll take that advice for the moment. We can’t begin to thank our Australian family for their immediacy, action and love.

So, we reckon that Zoe might have been on to something that night with all her talk about a bad parrot- I’ve never heard the expression before but it will now enter our family lexicon as meaning an omen. Tonight we will yet again raise a glass to being alive and well and to having a wonderful extended family.

Thanks so much all of you from Bas too...

BELLS’ ANGELS

BELLS’ ANGELS

Sorry, I had not factored the 3pm internet café siesta into my previous note. So, about the donkey.

Yesterday on arrival we ventured forth on our new bit of the island to find the supermarket near the castro and provision for some breakfasts and lunches. We are at about the same height that we were on the island in 2006 but not as central, so slightly different navigational marks are needed. And this time we have a front door and a back door in different laneways at different levels.

Nevertheless, in geographical terms we headed left to the sea edge then up, up, up and we saw the supermarket down, down, down, so did that. We procured fabulously fresh tomatoes, cherries and peaches; some feta and yoghurt; some Skopelos honey; and, bread and beer. We have our coffee plunger and coffee, and the house also comes with a plunger so we are set for some lunches and breakfasts. It’s about 6pm on Wed 10 June and I’ve just had lunch, so the Greek breakfast this morning did well.

We had a slowish breakfast pretty-much just gazing through our windows to the blue harbour, feeling good to be alive and here, and listening to the conversations from below rising towards us. It’s as though the words and sentences float up on little wisps of wind. A bit like the smells wafting up when food starts being cooked in the morning.

I needed to complete a report or two from Leipzig to send back and Bas needed to check out the studio at the top of the hill. We both made a start. I headed down to the internet café to complete my work but was sent home at 3ish. Bas was welcomed effusively by the team at the studio and taken by Giogos to his ‘shed’ at the edge of ‘the great view’ for a boys’ lunch including three Tsipouro (ouzo based) with freshly picked garden produce. Tsipouro at lunch time can have immediate effects so he returned and is currently having his post-lunch-Tsipouro snooze before we head back up for dinner at 8pm.

Skopelos Island has 365 churches for its 6000 inhabitants. Skopelos town has 123 of these churches and seven of them are within about 100 metres of us. The previous tenants wrote in the guest book that while they loved the house they were a little ambivalent about the bell ringing. We couldn’t see what the fuss was about, as we tend to hear them gently from afar. However, it’s now 6.15pm and Bas has just been bolted out of his Tsipouro slumber by our closest bell- see photo from front step- the sounds of which were obviously carried to us on angels’ wings and work miracles as a post-Tsipouro agent. Not only was Bas woken but he has also declared that there will never ever again be Tsipouro at lunchtime.

And about the donkey. On Monday, Wednesday and Friday the donkey collects the rubbish from the hook that we have not yet found so this morning when we woke about 8am to the clomp, clomp, clomp on the cobbles we knew that we had missed the donkey. We will aim to have a better rubbish response by Friday.

MISSED THE DONKEY

We're on Skopelos and it feels great. It's about 30 degrees by day. Blue Shutters House is everything on its internet site plus washing machine and clothesline out the front off the balcony. We had a lovely night in Skiathos on the way, at Bibis Hotel- the manager collected us from the airport and drove us a far as she could before the many, many steps- training for Skopelos! The photo of the ferry is from our Bibis room, HIGH above the town. We reintroduced ourselves to Greek food that night and caught a new super ferry cat at 11.30am next morning- a big downhill trek with luggage.

Steven (from our previous Cypress House) met us and helped us with luggage up the many steps HIGH above the town. We chilled yesterday afternnoon, returned to Molos last night ( a frequent taverna points candidate in 2006).

Internet cafe is closing for siesta- so I will too and continue later.

These fabulous canoodling seats were set up throughout the courtyard of the cultural (museums) precinct in Vienna. They were all occupied, so instead we went in to see Cy Twombly (very famous and expensive US-based artist) in the Museum of Modern Art and lots of strange videos and installations. The Art gallery shops were the most fun, as they had the most wonderful range of great gifts and so on. Unfortunately all the books were in German and the gifts were too expensive, so you all got postcards instead. They are coming.