Greece 2015 (#1)

Part 1: April 26th – 29th

By Watracz Is Traveling

After a pretty cold winter and a long time away from the motorbike saddle, I can hardly wait for the new adventures and challenges I’m going to face when traveling somewhere new!

After a pretty cold winter and a long time away from the motorbike saddle, I can hardly wait for the new adventures and challenges I’m going to face when traveling somewhere new. This time, it’s going to be Greece. The cradle of Western civilization, a tourist paradise, a bonanza of ancient monuments and ruins, of picturesque beaches, and wild mountains; the homeland of Aristotle, Socrates, and Plato. A country whose residents are seen as lazy and work-averse, but who make excellent cooks.

Below you can see the map of the whole trip. You can also view it on Google Maps.

Day 1: Banská Bystrica, Budapest, Novi Sad, Belgrade

April 26th, 2015

View day 1 route on Google Maps

Following a lengthy session of planning the route and of preparing the bike for a 3-week journey, I leave Krakow before dawn, at 5 a.m. and ride south towards Zakopane. The Tatras are cold. Around the Slovakia border, I need to put on my rainsuit and warm up with some hot tea from a thermos. I only stop to fill up, so it doesn’t take me too long to reach Hungary. I’m in Serbia in the afternoon.

Belgrade

Sometime around 6 p.m. I reach Belgrade, where I meet with Miroslav — I met him a few days earlier in the Facebook Aprilia group. He offered to have me stay overnight at his place, which is nice enough in and of itself, but what I’m seeing as I enter the house really boggles the mind. The table is set with delicacies prepared by Sanja, Miroslav’s girlfriend, accompanied by a few bottles of home-made Rakija. This certainly shapes up to be a fun evening.

We finish up the tasty supper and get down to drinking this Balkan invention (it’s really strong!) and talking about the cultures, differences between our countries, about bikes and travels — all in English, naturally. Serbian is impossible to understand, but a couple of words are very similar to their Polish counterparts. We’re later joined by Miroslav’s friends, and, somewhere around the second bottle of Rakija, they try to get me together with an eligible sister of theirs. They show me photos and explain how she hasn’t gotten married yet. They try to make me stay for a few days, so they could show me Belgrade and its surroundings. One of Miroslav’s friends, a bodybuilder, decides to show us videos of himself lifting weights. Everyone’s hospitality and friendliness is such a positive surprise. We take a group photo and I hit the sack before midnight. My head is going to be killing me in the morning!

Day 2: Niš, Kumanovo, Veles, Gevgelija, Thessaloniki

April 27th, 2015

View day 2 route on Google Maps

Wakeup is at 6 a.m., followed by a quick breakfast — and some chow for the road: sausage and vegetable rolls baked by Sanja. I say my goodbyes to Miroslav, thank them for their hospitality and head further south. We agree that I’ll visit them again, on my way back.

As I move south, it gets warmer and warmer, so I take off more and more clothes. The highway outside of Niš is under repair, and side-road detours take up a lot of my time. Around noon I get to the border with Macedonia, where the A1 highway takes me through beautiful mountains, valleys, and plenty of tunnels. At times I can hardly resist the urge to go off the planned route and wander around the area, just to see what’s on the other side of the valley or a mountain that looms on the horizon.

Eventually, I get to Greece. I already rode for 1,350 km, and the actual adventure is barely starting. I top up the bike at a station, and the teller gives me about €100 instead of €50. I notice it only sometime later and treat it as a favor of fortune. In the evening I pass through Thessaloniki and stop for the night at the “Ai Giannis” campsite, which I found through the ACSI app. The campsite is almost empty, it’s tough to find any other tourists. I ask the owner how much it is for the night; he tells me it’s €17, so I pull out my wallet and pay. He looks at it, thinks for a second, then takes out two bottles of beer from the fridge and hands them to me as a gift. Well, now I know I can haggle on the price of accommodation.

Day 3: Litochoro, Kokkinos, Olympiada, Kokkinopilos

April 28th, 2015

View day 3 route on Google Maps

I begin my day by lubricating the chain and checking the tire pressure. Or rather, by trying to check the pressure, since right after I take out my professional manometer, taped all over, it falls apart. Well, that’s it for having proper tire pressure during the trip. I pack my camp around 9 a.m. and head for the Olympus mountain range.

I reach the town of Litochoro and can see the mountains in the horizon, covered by clouds and the morning fog. I pass the new monastery of St. Dionysios of Olympus and get to the parking lot, by a stream that’s the starting point of hiking trails into the higher parts of the mountains.

I’m approached by a group of elderly Greeks who ask what I’m doing there. They’re surprised and very interested to learn why I came all this way alone, and where I’m heading next. They barely know any English, but we somehow manage to communicate.

On my way back, I stop at the side of the road, over a chasm, to take a photo with the bike against a backdrop of the mountains. I set up my tripod, but suddenly the wind picks up and tips over my bike. Well, there’s the first fall. I take off all the bags and cases to put it back up. Luckily, nothing’s wrong except for a handful of scratches on the paint job. When I put the cases back on, a group of bikers pull up on nice, German machines. I tell them — in English — to watch for the gusts of wind every now and then, and they reply “But we’re from Poland!” This group is also surprised that I’m taking this trip alone. After a short conversation we ride our own ways.

Kokkinos

I continue south and I arrive at the town of Kokkinos, where I make a short break for lunch — bread and salami brought all the way from Poland. From there, I take the winding mountain roads south-west, circling around the Olympus range from the south.

The mountaintops are covered with snow, clashing with my perception of Greece as a land of eternal sun and high temperatures. I thought I wouldn’t get to see snow at all, and yet — such a surprise.

The bike gets low on gas and the fuel light comes on. Time to look for a station. I refill in the town of Olympiada, then I go back a few kilometers and enter the mountains, where it becomes colder right away. I reach the Holy Trinity Monastery in Sparmos, which looks deserted from the outside.

There are no other vehicles on the snaking mountain road and it’s quite cold, about 10 degrees less than at the foot of the mountain.

As I reach the end of the road, I’m greeted by barbed wire and a tall fence, manned by soldiers with machine guns. I guess that’s a military base of some kind. I don’t think I can ride the bike any further, so I turn back and take the same road downhill, getting to Olympiada, then passing the villages of Skopia and Kalivia and heading towards Kokkinopilos.

It’s almost 7 p.m. when I get there, and the sun is slowly setting. Even though I’m not sleepy at all, it is time to look for a place for the night. My plan is to camp wild every other night to keep some money in my pocket. Supposedly, it’s not totally safe in Greece because of bears, snakes, and scorpions, but I’m hoping it’s going to be fine. No trip is complete without an adventure, after all; on the other hand, the last thing I need is a close encounter with a bear far from any trace of civilization.

I manage to find a clearing between the hillocks. It’s surrounded by trees, making it a pretty good place to pitch a tent. I hang the bag with my food on a branch, about 50 meters from the tent, walk around the perimeter, get my headlamp and my knife ready, and go to sleep. As usual, when spending a night in the wild, in a new place, I can’t fall asleep for a long time and even the slightest noise nearby makes me sit up.

Day 4: Elassona, Deskati, Kalabaka, Kastraki

April 29th, 2015

View day 4 route on Google Maps

Wake up time at 6 a.m. It’s cold. I feel like I were in the Alps, rather than in Greece. On top of that, it rained a little during the night. I take a few photos, then have a quick breakfast, pack my gear on the bike and move on. Today’s destination is the Meteora: the famous rock formations not far from the town of Kalabaka, 120 kilometers away from where I am now.

Sunrise over Olympus… this looks to be a beautiful day!

Kalabaka

I reach Kalabaka about 9. The town is full of life, and the views are out of this world. Vertical stone pillars and walls stand all over the area. The climate is completely different. It’s so hot that as soon as I find a store, I buy two large portions of ice cream and try to cool off on the inside even a little.

Orthodox monasteries were built on the tops of those rocks. The first was put up in mid-14th c by St. Athanasios. There are a total of 24 monasteries where monks used to live, and each of those was built on a different rock. The construction materials were hauled up on ropes, so it’s easy to imagine that the process was hard and dangerous.

I make my first stop by the Monastery of Great Meteoron (with the church of the Transfiguration), which is located at the tallest of the Meteora cliffs, at 613 m.a.s.l. Repair works are on by one of the walls. The cliffs around it give great vistas of the Varlaam and Rousanou monasteries.

I make a lunch break around noon. I take my salami, my kabanosy sausages, and the bread that came with me from Poland; then I sit on one of the rocks and make myself some sandwiches, enjoying the spectacular views. I envy the Greeks that they get to see this daily!

Riding on, I pass the Holy Trinity monastery and reach the final one, the monastery of St. Stephen. There are a dozen coaches on the parking lot, and throngs of tourists wandering around. Time to head back to the town to find a place to sleep.

I stop at the Vrachos Kastraki camp site and manage to negotiate a good price for the night. I set up my tent close to a gazebo and some trees. All that is going to make for a good spot to make my meals and hang my laundry. The camp site is close to the main road, near the monasteries, with a view of the cliffs. There’s even a pool, though I probably won’t have the time to take advantage of it. The gazebo has outlets outside, so I can charge the batteries for my camera. I take a shower and do some laundry. I’m having Greek cheese sandwiches this time. I don’t usually eat diary, but the cheese really hits the spot. Naturally, the kabanosy go with it beautifully.

I leave the camp site around 7 p.m. and ride towards the Meteora again, to catch the complex in the sun’s last rays. It shines through the thick clouds, and the colors are warm and rich.

There’s chaos on the route around the rocks. People, captivated by the view, stop on the side of the road or at a bend, and jump out of their cars with phones in hand to take photos. All you can hear are “wow’s” and “oooh’s.”

I sit down on a rock and just enjoy the view. You could spend hours just looking into the distance here.

I takes me a good half hour before I take the bike back to the camp site. I go through my photos before I go to sleep and remove the fluff in order to free up some space on the memory card. Today was a good day. Tomorrow’s plans are to wake up at 5 a.m. and go for the mountains to catch the sunrise. I wonder if it’ll be able to match the sunset today.