Still stuck in Sougia

Maybe the tiny south western Crete village of Sougia wasn't the smartest place to go to for Greek Easter, when the buses stop and the spring winds keep the ferry boats away for days at a time.  I am wondering why I left Paleochora with its three buses a day, plenty of walks, car hire even. Of course Sougia's appeal is its isolation and the fact that not many people go there.

Getting here was hard enough - I had planned to do it the easy way with the ferry boat from Paleochora. All the Sougia passengers are waiting at the wharf at 9am, the boat turns up, but then won't let us on board.  They reckon they can't land at Sougia because of the rough sea. Now at this point I could have decided to stay in Paleochora with its three buses a day, or even gone back to Chania with buses galore, but because there is a path I decided to walk it.

It's a beautiful route, along the sea, a smallish hill to climb then descend to the site of ancient Lissos, another little up and then down through a gorge to Sougia. Simple.  Alas, at this point I discovered that what I read and what it feels like to actually do it with a slightly too heavy pack are two different things. This is also when I discover a major difference between the tracks of Crete and those in Aotearoa:  Cretan paths are very stony and the rocks all seem to be sharp and pointed, so by the end of a day's walking my feet felt bruised. The walking is also very exposed, on hillsides with little more than prickly groundcovers among the rocks.

And what looks like a simple short up is actually a long slog when you are not used to it.  However, the views did make up for some of it - and there is no way I would have experienced this on the boat.

That was Friday and since then I have been in Sougia where the last bus left Friday about two hours before I arrived and there hasn't been a single boat.  We were told the Monday bus was cancelled because of Easter, so the next bus is Wednesday, though one did turn up out of the blue today (Monday) but none of us were ready to take it and it left 5 minutes later.

Sougia luckily is quite a delightful place, though once you have walked to one end of the beach and back there is not much else to walk to. So back to the cafe with wifi for another pot of tea.

Here's most of Sougia - it is easy to get in one photo:

I'm staying in a largely empty pension and the family who owned it have been giving me food every time I walk by, as they have been feasting over Easter.  Before midnight on Saturday it was all vegetarian - best dolmades I have ever had made by Soula - and then after church at midnight it was a feast of lamb shanks. I can't face lamb at midnight at the best of times so gave it a miss, but the now legless lamb was spit roasted the next day, along with a lot of beer drunk.  Unfortunately I developed a stomach bug so wasn't able to partake of much - which felt like a tragic waste of the poor wee lamb.

Today I went for a walk in the Agia Irini gorge, a nice gentle downhill shaded by pine trees, but with some impressive rock falls from the cliffs above.  I met a lamb that had escaped Easter in the gorge:

So now I have run out of places to go and we are waiting to hear if there is a bus tomorrow or if it's Wednesday. Not sure what I will do tomorrow - I tell myself I have to do more 'being' rather than 'doing', but it is not really my nature.  Relax? By a beach? with six cafes to choose from?  Where's my guided historical sites tour with every minute filled in when I needed it?