Send this page address - CLICK HERE - to a friend !Tuesday - The End October 13, 2009 Well, not really the end but probably the end of our regular daily bulletins. We expect things to be somewhat less exciting from now on so I am not going to attempt to upload a daily bulletin any more. Instead, we'll pick out interesting facts, discoveries and incidents and upload them on a random basis. Today after doing a bit of tidying, filling drawers, and eating breakfast, we headed for Souda to do some shopping. | Yesterday there was a lorry-load of soil dumped on our local road. (Sorry, we drove over it three times but didn't think to photograph it and now it's gone.) Today there are huge blue plastic pipes. (On our return journey we saw that black pipes had been added on the opposite side of the road.) | 
| | The National Highway is being resurfaced. First they scrape off the top layer of tarmac, leaving a surface like a washboard. They scrape BOTH sides of the road at once. No namby-pamby one-way system here... | 
| | ...hang on. Let's have a closer look at those signs! This is AFTER we'd passed a "20" sign. Take your pick!  20 - 40 - 60 - 30 | 
| | Anyway, no "namby-pamby one-way routing with traffic lights here! Just get a few men wearing green tabards to wave red flags around and let the traffic get on with it. Here we are, on the wrong side of the road, heading straight for oncoming traffic as flag-man waves us past the lorries! | 
| | The grotty surface continues for miles, with some vehicles trying to do 30kph, most doing 50kph and a few brave souls overtaking at 70kph. Motorcycles are at a distinct disadvantage as their narrow tyres attempt to follow the ruts. | 
| | Despite the clouds over the mountains, it's actually a hot, sunny day. That's not water on the road but sunlight reflecting off the polished tarmac. The forecast for today (and the next few days) is windy (they got that right) sunny (they got that right) and no rain (but yesterday they were predicting rain so we'll wait and see! Anyway, we found the "Champion" supermarket on the "Souda Road", not far from the naval base, which is enclosed by high stone walls festooned with notices in Greek and English warning that photos are forbidden! | | The supermarket is quite small and on two floors, requiring the use of a lift to move the trolley between them. This is a typical Greek lift where you can see (and touch) the wall as the lift moves! | 
| | As our shopping included chilled foods, we wasted no time in driving home, where Jenny cooked lunch while I worked on this. This afternoon I worked until around 6pm when we boarded the car and drove to Manolis' workshop to collect the shelf that he'd borrowed to colour match the new furniture. | | While we were there I asked if he could make some dividers for the new drawers "but not right now" (all in Greek of course). I showed him my sketch and he insisted on making them right away, while we waited. When I tried them they were an exact push-fit; no glue required. And he refused to charge me a cent! | 
| | My new computer work station is already gathering "clutter". | 
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Send this page address - CLICK HERE - to a friend ! Bed time now. "Kalee Neekta". Chapter 26 - Life continues - and a few observations Return to Index |