Well, we thought it would be a bit of a quiet day today, arriving in Igoumenitsa and setting up camp. But in the end we had a bit of a scramble to avert a disaster.
In this next gripping installment of John and Sue do Europe…
Over night, having left Ollie on the car deck…
… we explored the ship…
And settled down with a movie (Arrival) before bed.
We both had an unsettled night, even though we’d gone for a more expensive cabin. There were thunderstorms overnight and the crossing was rough. We’d been put at the front of the boat and on the 7th floor. So we were bouncing up and down quite a bit in the waves. All in all though, having a cabin was definitely a plus, and being able to lie down seemed to mean neither of us got any sea sickness in the swell.
In the morning the cabin crew were desperate to get everyone out of their berths ASAP, and so we handed in our room key to reception by about 8 – docking at 9. But we still had time for a coffee in the bar on deck 5.
It was then a quick shop at the biggest supermarket Apple Maps was letting us see, Masoutis (Μασούτης – WTF) on the north side of Igoumenitsa. Not a huge store but well stocked for essentials and even a gluten free section.
We were scrabbling for something to do today and so parked the van on the sea front and went for a stroll.
The storms that made our crossing so rough had clearly hit the town too. Many of the shoreline cafes were tarped up and so we found one of the “next row back” cafes for a not-stand-up.
Thought of the day: Landing in Greece is like being dropped into an advanced trigonometry lesson! All these α,β,φ,ψ everywhere! I’m seriously having to stop at every word and try and figure out what letters it contains and then what the f’ it might mean! #greecenoobie!
Back to today… We were torn between heading somewhere a few 10’s of Km away and making a day of it vs getting to the campsite early for a decent pitch.
After coffee and a BP refuel we plumped for heading to the campsite early. Which got us to Elena’s Camping by about 12.
The campsite is right on the water front and was suffering from the same storms we’d experienced on the boat… There was mud deposited on the driveways around the site and evidence of vans struggling to escape their pitches in the morning. The campsite “manager” (?) said they hadn’t had rain in 5 months, so wasn’t complaining.
It was nice when we showed up though…
We were out on a pitch only 15m from the water. Lovely and scenic, but we’re on a thoroughfare and would rather have had something a bit more private. We are next the the WiFi zone though.
Loos and showers are plentiful and clean. There are loo seats too, hooray, but no loo paper, boo!.
The downside of our decision to hit the campsite early is that we’re sort of stuck here. More thunderstorms have been rolling around this afternoon and there don’t seem to be any coastal walks to head anywhere. It’s also a bit too hilly to get the bikes out and go anywhere meaningful.
We have another day to kill here tomorrow before our ferry on Thursday, so we’re torn about whether to pack up the van in the morning and head out for the day or sit at the site and perhaps try and walk into the nearest village.
Errrr… scratch that!
I wrote that last paragraph this afternoon before we’d really sat down to think about what we were going to do tomorrow. And as luck would have it Sue pulled out the Ig. to Corfu ferry tickets and realized we’re actually sailing tomorrow.
Aaarrrggghh!
Somehow we’d got it in our heads that we were sailing on the 12th, but no! It’s the 11th.
So, we did what anyone would do in that situation, we went and did the washing up!
As we were pondering our options we decided to contact the apartment we have booked in Corfu and see if they could slot us in a day early.
One website contact form and a phone call later and that was arranged.
Phew!
Cat-a-strofe averted!
It hadn’t become a panic, because for some unknown reason I don’t panic anymore (one of the benefits of being retired and not giving a fetid-dingo’s-kidney about anything), but we were starting to think we’d have to wing one night in Corfu. But crisis averted and we have an additional night of luxury tomorrow instead of sleeping in a lay by!
To celebrate we went to the beach to watch the sunset…
… and on the way we bumped into the NZ couple I’d given directions to the showers to earlier.
They are on a propa’ adventure.
They’re cycling from Brussels (though they live in London) to Georgia, Tbilisi. They’d done Brussels to Sicily and were now heading through Greece and Turkey. And that’s including a month off after the woman had been knocked off her bike and had to be taken to hospital to be stitched up. But that’s not all, once they’ve got to Georgia they’re starting a new adventure and cycling from Nairobi to Cape Town! Respect!
So… it’ll be a reasonably early start to catch the 10:45 ferry to Corfu tomorrow instead of “wasting” a day here at Elena Camping.
We’ll be back in Igoumenitsa in about 11 days time, but we’ll be in a “heading home” frame of mind. In the 12 hours we’ve been in Greece, we’ve found the roads to be cleaner and in better condition than in south-eastern Italy. The drivers are also much more considerate!
Side note on Fuel Prices: We’ve seen a big range in fuel prices on the trip so far. The worst was over €2 a litre in Germany but has ranged from a countrywide cap of 1.39 in Croatia up to 1.6 in Italy. It’s about 1.49 here in Greece it seems.
Harry has done bugger all today as John was catching up with the Apple keynote on iPhone 16 and Apple Watch series 10!
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