There were violent winds last night. I had to get up in the middle of the night and retrieve our clothes off the line for fear they would be blown away and I would be without a bathing suit.
Yesterday was initially disappointing in the acquisition front. We returned to the black sand beach, one of Kyr’s favorites although I am terrified of the jellyfish there. At one moment Kyr and I were just rounding the point when he grabbed me and pointed to a beautiful cerulean pie plate sized jellyfish just ahead of us. We frantically swam away and paused to get our bearings when he yelled that there was one right beside me. I barely knew which way to move. I’m too nervous a person to have to be on the lookout like that. I think we managed to find only 1 abalone ½ shell. So it hardly seemed worth it. When we got back to the hotel some guy was hogging the inflatable inner tube Kyr likes to use to jump through in the pool. He has constructed quite the challenges for himself. So we were forced to snorkel in our own little bit of the sea. Of course it turns out to be the best snorkeling so far. Teams of fish. Lots of abalone ½ shells. Up until now you really had the sense of the doom of the ocean – so few fish, and you wonder how you can morally harvest any. But just where we were last night, there was a tiny sense of how the ocean used to be. It is all quite sad. And those jellyfish are just pointing out how dramatically things have changed – they are one of the species that moves in when the fish go.
The other thing that I have noticed is how interminably long it takes to break up volcanic soil. I used to look at Hawaii and marvel just how permanent some of the lava fields seemed with their historic walking trails right through the lava. Now it is a whole island that is eeking along in soil development. It is just mesmerizing to me the number of rocks everywhere. It makes those piles of rock obscuring some prairie fields seem like a sprinkling of salt. These people must have been heroic to move some of the rocks aside and tentatively plant the olive trees. The trees themselves must be eternal optimists to have grown without soil. The whole thing is shocking. How does anything make it?
Last night when we were having a bit of ouzo on our own terrace (Yanna was out and her husband was in charge so there was no procuring any type of beverage other than greek beer as he speaks no English) we heard a voice in the distance that was coming from a megaphone. Although the words were greek the cadence was that of an auctioneer. I maintained up and down it had to be an auction, Joop said no way it was a watermelon salesman. They drive around with a truck of watermelons announcing their wares through a megaphone. He must have been right because the voice did move around.
Our nighttime taverna had live music last night and lots of greek dancing. Joop really got into the spirit of the thing and as we went to the kitchen to pick out our meals he waltzed in and nearly took out the waiter with his zorba the greek hand movements.
Despite the aggressive winds that will probably prevent swimming, the heat is unchanged. How fair is that? Yesterday I had to go on an exploration to find waterproof sunscreen. A very rare beast. If you can believe it the majority of the products are tan enhancers. A person would die using that stuff. I finally found a precious bottle of the waterproof SPF 30 for a minor $25. I am really glad I brought some stuff with us initially. It is just too bad we went through it so fast. Right now Kyr is sitting in the car playing his Nintendo DS. He only has a car charger left because he blew out his adapter the day we arrived. Joop is enjoying my Penelpe Lively novel; he even occasionally laughs outloud. It is quite amusing. I am rushing through Willa Cather and devouring all of the prairie homesteading novels. They are very good. I might leave the itinerary up to the boys today to spare me anxiety because everymorning I have to spend time recovering from my nightmares.
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