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JULY
WEATHER ...
Extremely hot! This is, all over Greece, the
start of the major fire risk season. It is seriously hot, whilst
fires destroy flora and fauna - and sometimes people. A serious loss.
Even without the fires the intense sunlight will destroy your skin and possibly
you! _____________________________
Romantic Island, Astratigos!
Nick & Wendy Jeins: Were
house sitting here in Astratigos back in '2000 when the bug bit! Nick
proposed on 17 July 1999! Right Here. Married 5 Years!
Click here
Astratigos Village Life...
The month July sees the temperatures rising towards baking, not far short
of their following peak in August. Somewhere
along the line we will be warned about mere averages of 43oC,
fairly warm, but here in Astratigos, on our sun-trapped balcony, it has been
in excess of 50oC. On the way to boiling. On the way to
boiling what? Well, water, milk, ice cream, apples, pears, people...
WAit a moment, PEOPLE? Well, no, not really people, just brains
maybe.... Mine!!
Ring, ring, ring... 'Hello'? 'Yassas Kiria. How do I get to your
house from Kolimbari, I am in Chania'?... Ah yes, that follows.... Jokes
about not starting from there were quickly shelved, in favour of a precise
reply, when the caller turned out to be the man who was to fit our air new
conditioning. Preferably before we melted. 'Sorry, I don't
understand' he said on being given directions. 'I will 'phone you from
Kolimbari'... OK, keep cool, it wasn't a bad plan...
Ring, ring, ring... 'Hello'? 'Yassas Kiria. It is I again'. 'Ok,
take the left fork at the crossroads (!) head for Monastery Gonias, then to
Afrata'... then... 'Yes, yes, Ok, wait, I will 'phone you again
from Afrata'! He was gone. Hopefully in the direction of Afrata.
Ring, ring, ring... 'Hello'? 'Yassas Kiria. It is I again. I am at
Afrata'. 'OK, turn left, Aristera' shouted Pam at the 'phone...
'OK? Ok... He's coming' she said. 'I had better meet him in the square'.
Off she went, returning very quickly with this magical engineer from
Chania. 'Kalimera Kirie'. 'Kalimera - milate Anglika'..(do you
speak English)? 'You do, good! Shall we decide where to put the
units? Ok, C'mon'...
Lounge; kitchen; corridor; bedrooms; (surely not the bathroom or loo?). Never mind, look
everywhere! For inspiration, I thought darkly to myself... upstairs; ah.. the big bedroom is open over half the lounge! Up
here is ideal. Two cools for the price of one!
Outside we go, onto the the getting serious steam up, sun-trapped
balcony. Good. Facing south. Would exhaust the moist air quickly in
summer and be protected from the more serious (and they are serious) elements
in winter. Exhaust machine (condenser) - on the wall or on the floor? On the floor I
say. Better on the wall he says, less pipe work visible. Ok.
Inside we go. Which wall? Over the bed I say.. Better on the other wall
over the mirror, he advises. Less pipe work? You guessed it - less pipe work. We
measured, mainly using that old favourite the fisherman's' rule. Outstretched
arms! One looked shorter... But then I'm no Mantovani...
His virtual 'machines' also seemed much smaller than I remembered them the day we had
visited the store in Chania to choose them.. But no matter, when we came to
offer up the real machines all would be resolved. No problem.. I was trying to
remember a saying - 'Babies and bathwater' no, 'True love...running smoothly'
no, 'A stitch in time' no - ah... 'It will all come out with the
bathwater'! Got it...
'It
will all come out with the bathwater' I said, significantly. At least
that's how it felt. Important. S I G N I F I C A N T...... Good, it felt good.
We had faced the worst. Weathered the storm. And now we had it by the
throat!! In an hour or so I would be basking in a supremely cool
bedroom/lounge, whichever
took my fancy. Maybe both. Why not? No lowly baking away in the
scorching sun for me... A
bit of class...
'Kirie'
- our engineer broke into my reverie - he had work to do - now. No time for
fantasy or day dreams. A living to make... 'Where are the machines'?......
'The machines', Pam and I chorused together - 'the machines'? But you have
them surely? The people in Chania said that you would bring them'.
'Ah, hem! Well now'.. He sat slowly down on the step in the sunshine - in the
rapidly climbing heat - and said...'the problem seems to be in Chania'.
Now I
didn't know that!!...
'It will all come out in the wash' said Pam... Significantly... |
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Site
News
How about that?....
Since we first published our site in 2001 it has
grown slowly but surely to its present size. Cretanvista contains more than
1500 files; supported by over 1000 photographs (mostly high quality). To
keep it all together there are more than 4,000 links between the files.
If you read our news page you may notice some of the links to other sites,
all of which have to be replaced with an updated set for each edition - once a
month... As does the news page itself
Just
to remind you ......
Don't forget you
can access this website via several different spellings of our site name. So
if your typing skills are a bit 'iffy' you can still find us. We also
use different ISP's and domain endings to ensure continuous access. Try it: www.cretanvistas.co.uk
really is no different to www.cretanvista.gr
- except that you receive them from different parts of the world.
Books & Good Reading
Since the last news our book reviews have increased by two:-
The Cool Guide to Living
in Crete (Carol Palioudaki).
The Cretan Runner (George Psychoundrakis) Unfortunately
I was only able to add one before I was out of time! Typsetting is very time
consuming - though Ann Lisney will not be amused...
The people behind the books:
Every book review has an
introductory paragraph about the author/s. We have decided to go a little
further and where possible, include profiles of not only these talented
authors but also, where we can, of people behind them. Good examples are
'Patouchas' - Ioannis Kondylakis (Read the review)
and 'Who Pays The Ferryman' - Michael J. Bird (Read the review)
These profiles will be attached to relevant book reviews. Watch this
space...
Photo Galleries
Wild Flowers: 96 different wild flowers. 99% have been taken right
here at the base of the Rodopos peninsula. We are continually working on
these galleries and will soon been adding further pages including detailed reference pages and more
photos of each specimen. There are now more than 3,600 flower photographs in our
databases.
Bird Galleries. Athanasios Sakoulis, who contributed the
magnificent gallery from his book on Cretan wildlife has now contributed
18 pictures of birds for addition to a gallery which we will attach to Paul
Smiths bird-watching page in the near future. Something worth waiting
for..
Insects..
We have built up an extensive collection of photographs from which
we are producing galleries for our wild life page. The next of these
will be insects - about which we have received few queries, but many of which
are supremely photogenic. We have some beautiful reptiles too...
There are now 13 galleries featuring aspects of Cretan life, including sunrise and sunset pictures;
Souda Bay War Cemetery; and a gallery of magnificent wild-life pictures by Anastasios Sakoulis, author of "Stigmotipa Tis Kritikis Freesis"
(Moments of Cretan Nature) - (Links below - bottom right column); our infant gallery about house renovation; and of course our annual calendar galleries
containing 60 or so pictures of north western Crete.
There are of course many other areas being developed all the time - including new ones
in the pipeline.... Our weaving page for example, is now being
progressed to match the practice which has taken place since the page was
first added.
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Are we listening, do we hear?
We are and we do. The continuously increasing numbers of visitors and complimentary e-mails seem to show that our visitors - 21,000 plus individual visits in our best month last year - appreciate our efforts.
GUEST BOOK LINK
NB. Please don't use the Guest Book to place website links - any URLs - or contact style messages, are automatically disabled/removed in the interests of minors. Questions can be sent to us privately at:
cretanvista.gr
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