Adventure #6: Clidonia!
Rosy, Sameerah, SJ, Pen Pen, and I headed down to Megalo at 8am to go horseback riding at Ianthe's sister's place. I got Kera who was described to me as the lazy one, So he and I got along great. About half way through the trip Kera and I decided screw it, and went and played some Mario Kart and ate Doritos on the couch. Good times. He made so many Simpsons references. This is Pen Pen riding Kera.
Last year I took a hike to the nearby abandoned village: Clidonia. Or Kledonia. I kind of fell in love. There's a house there that's mostly still standing and wouldn't be too hard to fix up and make livable. I've been talking about it all year, so Rosy, Pen Pen, and I hiked up after breakfast to see it. It's about an hour and a half hike or an hour and a half drive. To walk there, you walk through Megalo to where the sidewalk ends and then keep going. This is Pen Pen paying tribute to Shel Silverstein.
We passed by a herd of cattle on the way. We could hear their bells from a mile in either direction. This is Pen Pen needing more cowbell.
The hike was unfathomably beautiful. We would walk in zig zags down to gorges and then back up. The path is marked with red stones, sometimes arrows, and two or three signs. All of them are at arbitrary intervals, and often hard to see. So it's pretty hard to get lost. This is Pen Pen navigating the trail.
We only got lost once on the way there. Three times if you count the times I saw something cool and wanted to go explore and then took a minute to find my way back to the path. So basically just once. At the peak you could see from miles in every direction. This is Pen Pen enjoying a 380 degree panoramic view from a mountaintop shrine.
Although people had been leaving for years, the village was completely abandoned in the 60's. There was no road up to it, so the younger generation was moving down the mountain to the cities beneath. Apparently people like roads. Kids these days. In the intervening 40 years, many of the buildings have decayed and crumbled. A few years ago, the ever anonymous “they” decided the peak just east of the village was an ideal location for a cell tower. So “they” added a new paved road up to the village and another mile up to the cell tower. Like “they” do. This is Pen Pen looking down at the village from the cell tower.
There are a few structures still in good shape. There's the Taverna, which is open all year round. There's also a farm. A few houses under repair and disrepair. And of course, my house. We got to the village tired, hungry, and thirsty. The Taverna was open, and the waiter spoke excellent English. He told us they had spinach pie and Greek salad. Those were our options. We chose both. Both were excellent. This is Pen Pen feasting after a long hike.
After lunch we explored the village for a while. All the buildings with doors on them were locked. Our waiter told us that in addition to the Farm, some families are starting to come back to the village, or building new houses in the village. This means I have to act fast to get my house. We found a house that had burned down at some point after it was abandoned. The doors and windows were blocked up with rock, but the back half was completely demolished. The interior was covered with the stones from the wall, and all the beams were charred black. This is Pen Pen exploring the ruins.
We wandered up to an old church on a cliff and sat for a while admiring the view of the fields below. Then we walked up to my house. I have a dream of one day buying and fixing up this house and spending the rest of my life sitting on top of a mountain writing. I'd miss everybody a lot, but seriously. Did you see the panorama? I'll also have a pet goat, and a donkey. And maybe a Vespa. This is Pen Pen, windswept, gazing up to the house.
It had two stories once, but now doesn't even have one floor. It also is distinctly lacking in doors, windows, and functional chimneys. To say nothing of its' profound lack of heating, electricity, or plumbing. Oddly enough, because of its proximity to the Taverna, it does have WIFI. So it's basically perfect. This is Pen Pen peering out through an ex window.
We started on back to Megalo with a minimum of distractions. We did see a building with a moat, though. A moat! On a mountain! Mountain moat! Like all the cool stuff, it was locked. So we walked back briskly trying to get Rosy back in time for rehearsal. Despite getting horribly lost once, we actually made it just as the cast was starting to congregate for rehearsal. We walked down to the general store, which is apparently run by 8 year olds, and bought some refreshments. In solidarity with the store's proprietors, I got a juice box. This is Pen Pen back at our hotel room sharing my juice box.
The apprentice company had a performance of Theyestes in Vikos, so the full company headed out there to watch. The sun set slowly behind their open performance space. Afterwards we all came back to the house for a big meal, another late night singalong, some drinks, and then more drinks. There's a local drink called Tsipouro which is distilled from the residue of the wine press. It's fantastic. And strong. And fantastic. Some time around midnight we started to panic because we had no play to read tomorrow, so Rosy graciously volunteered one of mine. Specifically a new one called “Our Lady of the Holy Powerstrip” which is only in it's first draft. I stayed up for another hour or so trying to get it ready to be read by actors. This is Pen Pen correcting grammar.
This is a song I wrote this one time. You should download it and share it with your friends.
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