The holidays over, time to share the snaps

Well our holiday got off to a great start, we were enjoying a drink at the bar after we arrived and the earth shook, literally, yes, there was an earthquake, a 5.6.

It was quite funny really, there were about 6 couples sat there, all talking and I don't think any conversation stopped, we looked at each other but it wasn't until it stopped that we said, was that an earthquake??  It lasted for 10 - 15 seconds and you could actually hear the rumbling and you could see the bar top shaking, but we all just carried on as though nothing happened lol

We went to a little Greek Island called Lesvos (or Lesbos), a place called Petra, which gets it's name from the rock (petra) that stands in the middle of the village.

On top of the rock is a church, Virgin Mary of the Sweet Kisses. 

Cobbled street leading up past the rock

View from the top

Some of the cobbled streets in Petra

View from just outside the village

I just missed the sun going down on the last night, but I did get the lovely red sky

The next photos are of our visit to Skala Sikamininas

The little harbour in Skala Sikaminias

This is the place that made the news some time ago, where there was a surge of refugees, do you remember?

There are only 100 people living in this tiny village and they helped save refugees from sinking boats as they tried to make their way across.  Sadly the news put tourist off and the village suffered badly as a result.  There is not much to see, just a few taverners, a pretty church and a couple of gift shops, but it's totally unspoilt and so tranquil.

 We hopped on the land train into Molyvos, it was about 15 minutes or so from where we were staying in Petra

Looking back towards Petra from the land train

Molyvos, possibly the prettiest place we have ever been in Greece

There are beautiful little cobbled streets

Every little house has made the most of the little bit of space they have, making steps and patios pretty with plants and pots

I loved the one below, not much space but wow, it looked beautiful!

And I loved the little windows

And the shutters

We walked up to the castle on the top of the hill, the views were amazing

Unfortunately after trudging up the hill we discovered the castle was closed for maintenance work, so we were unable to go in, we did meet a little donkey though :-)

We walked down to Molyvos harbour via the pretty cobbled streets and enjoyed a well deserved drink.

While we were there the owner of the taverner caught an octopus right there in the harbour, i'd never seen one in real life before

The weather then suddenly changed, it looked like were in for a storm

Lucky for us it passed over with only a few spots of rain and then the sun came out again.

We hired a car for a day to get to Skala Skaminias and just to enjoy the beautiful scenery round about really, but we had heard about a little Turkish Bath so we found that out too and enjoyed an hour alternately dipping in cold and then hot water, supposedly it helps with aches and pains, I can honestly say that it's made no difference whatsoever, lol, but it was something different :-)

The holiday was not without it's problems, as usual I got bitten, whether by mosquitoes or something else I'm not sure but I had quite a lot on my feet and ankles and my foot started to swell up so I had to visit the doctor in Petra.  I came away with antibiotics to take for 10 days, antihistamine, take for the same time, 2 lots of cream to apply to the bites and some cream to stop getting bitten again!  Mark did have a few bites this time too, but mine seem to get infected, it's no fun.  This is one of the reasons we only go away for 7 days at a time now, once I start to get bitten I just want to come home, It stops being a holiday and becomes a battle of the bites!

Lesvos is a beautiful place and it's a shame they have suffered with all the bad publicity that the refugee thing bought on them, on the other hand, the fact that not many people are visiting makes it a great place to go, it's Greece as it used to be in the late 1970's and early 1980's, very laid back and friendly with none of the commercialism. 

I know I've shared a lot of photos, I do like keeping a track of things I've seen and places I've been on my blog, It's nice to look back on.   I hope that you like seeing them to.

I'll leave you with just one more

Greece is known for it's cats and Lesvos is no different, in fact I think there were more here than I've seen in other places.  It's very tempting to feed them, but you can't feed them all, (and Mark tells me off), although I did see evidence that some villagers do put food and water out for them, which is good.  We came across a mum with her kitties when we were walking and this one was just to cute to ignore.

Look at that little face!

Seeing how they have to scavenge around for food makes me so sad, 

On the last night I did save some of my dinner and we went back to the place where mum and kitties were so we could leave it for them, so I did manage to do my good deed.

It's back to business as usual tomorrow, we caught up on some of the garden work today, everything seems to have shot up and greened up in the short time we were away, but Stevie has looked after my plants well and everything has survived :-)  The majority of the holiday washing is done and put away, the rest I will do in the week, just some food shopping to do tomorrow, I feel a salad week is called for after the indulgence of Greek food and more bread than I ever normally eat, I'm guessing the scales won't be kind to me on Wednesday when I weigh in :-(  Looks like going back to basics to get back on track.

Until next time,

I hope you all have a great week

-X-

Destination Lesvos, Greece

I'm glad it's Friday, are you?  

There has been so much to do this week, lots of running errands because we are going on holiday tomorrow :-)

Now I must confess that I almost never look forward to going away on holiday, there is just so much preparation involved, unless your name is Mark that is, in which case holidays require no preparation whatsoever, you just present your sunglasses kindle and charger, certain in the knowledge that the holiday fairy has washed and ironed the clothes, shopped for holiday essentials, packed the cases, found the passports and collected the euros, lol.  

I swear, if I come back in another life, i'm being a man and getting my own back, either that or a cat, because lets face it both have fairly easy lives, as long as they are fed and watered at regular intervals and have somewhere to sleep they are not much trouble, lol.

That's what you get for wanting to be in control of everything, no help!

To be honest I have everything in hand, I packed one case last night and the rest of the things were packed this afternoon.  We have a lunch time flight so hopefully there will be no mad rush out the door.  I will relax when we have checked in our bags and are in the departure lounge :-)

I hope you all have a lovely weekend, and week ahead, enjoy the weather if you are in the UK, it's supposed to be a scorcher!

I will see you all in weeks time, hopefully refreshed, re-charged and raring to go :-)

Until next time
-X-

A Hook and a Book, and charity shop finds

I hope you are all enjoying a relaxing Sunday afternoon.  For me Sunday has always been a day to re-charge my batteries, no wandering around shopping centres or food shopping for me, I like nice quiet Sunday's, sometimes I cook a roast other times, like today, we will have something quick and easy later in the evening.  This morning I have done the ironing and had a lovely soak in the bath and caught up on a bit of reading, bliss :-)

I have been watching a few podcasts again and recently Sam, of Betsy Makes mentioned something she had subscribed to, A Hook and a Book, I thought it sounded interesting so went in search and signed up for the June parcel.

The idea is each month you receive a hook, a book, a ball of yarn and a pattern, which is sort of themed to the book 

This is what was in my parcel when it arrived earlier this week.

Isn't it a great package!  I was very happy with it.  I've never read The Hobbit and I don't know if it will be too much in the realms of fantasy for me but I'm going to give it a go.  It's such a lovely little hard backed book too with lovely illustrations.  Have you read The Hobbit? What did you think?

I had a wander around the charity shops after work on Friday and came away with a couple of good finds.

This chicken caught my eye.  I did have a lovely Masons chicken to keep my eggs in but it got broken when we had the kitchen done recently.  This one is not so eye catching but I think It fits perfectly in with my new kitchen colours :-) 

I've seen these vintage cake stands in many places and Mark has always put me off buying one, but this time he wasn't with me, so home it came, lol.

It's in great condition and will come in very handy when we have Joanne afternoon tea baby shower :-)

I'm really happy with this purchase.  I don't know if I should just give it a good polish and keep it this colour or should I give it an Anne Slone make over? What do you think?

That's it for today, I hope you have a great week whatever you are up too.

Until next time

-X-

Thinking about what happened in Manchester and London

Only last week I was saying what a wonderful time we had visiting London again and our trip up to the viewing gallery in the Shard, and then on Saturday in the very area we had been the previous week, there was another cowardly terrorist attack.

We had walked around Borough Markets and enjoyed looking at all the lovely food that was on sale before visiting the Shard, it is tightly packed and must have been so so scary.

But, it won't put me off visiting London again, you can't put you life on hold because some idiots  object to the Western way of life.  

This photo popped up on my FB feed this week, I can't find the original feed but the caption was, 

This country survived the blitz and the milkman still delivered the milk. Do these pieces of low life ever really believe they can break the will and determination of the British people ?
No bloody chance.

I found it a very apt message.

I thought the photo said it all

Until next time

Stay safe

-X-