Of thunder storms, olives, .... and earthquakes

Our local roads ...

After our first few weeks in Greece it is time to report in. Our first observation is that we’re glad we’re not elsewhere in Europe at this time of year! While winter approaches with single-figure temperatures further north, we’ve experienced temperatures consistently in the high teens or low 20s. Certainly warm enough to spend our working days outdoors in t-shirts and shorts. However, we have experienced rain – bucket-loads of the stuff - accompanied by lightning and thunder that rolls on for hours on end, thankfully often at night. These are the biggest and longest thunderstorms we have ever experienced by far – exciting for us indeed.

Koroni

Koroni alley

We are near the little harbour town of Koroni, near but not in. We usually walk into town at the weekends, avoiding the main road so we can avoid certain death at the hands of Greek drivers, and taking the single-lane concrete and mud tracks through the olive groves. Even when we resist stopping every few minutes to exercise our cameras it still takes about 1¼ hours to get there. Koroni is a bit of a tourist town – white-washed houses, restaurants along the water front, little alleyways between houses, and a few gift shops. Indeed quite the opposite of most of the other little towns and villages around here – they are somewhat agricultural with most buildings and streets being in a state of disrepair.  Some of the smarter houses in the area are owned by foreigners who have departed for the winter. Koroni does have a Venetian-era fortress though which include huge bastions that you can venture inside of, as long as you don't pay attention to the large cracks in the ceiling...

Inside fortress

“Agricultural” describes this area at this time of year. Though there are quite a few houses for rent in summer when there will be plenty of tourists around, now we are probably two of very few foreigners around. In a normal year there would be plenty of Albanian itinerant workers around for the olive harvest, but not this year because of the low yield this year. All the land is covered by olives with just a sprinkling of grape vines (harvested for wine and raisins). And the car parks in town are full of utes or tractors and trailers with bags of olives in the back.

Greek is a difficult language and we haven’t made much of an effort yet apart from saying  Hello, which always elicits a friendly response from the locals. They’ve seen us wandering around the roads and village often enough now to recognise us. We’re lucky that we’ve met quite a few of the locals via our hosts, Michael and Maria.  They are well integrated into the local community and, having good Greek, have many friends and acquaintances locally. One of the local restaurants has live music each Friday night, and our hosts have taken us there. Greek music? Interesting! We also had a big party here a few weeks ago. Greeks don’t celebrate their birthdays but almost every day of the year is a “name day” (yiorti) where everyone with that day’s name gets to celebrate together. Certain days are more popular than others as there is traditionally a very limited set of first names to choose from: in this area there appears to be approximately six male names! Very confusing.

Food in Greece is always one of the highlights. And it is lucky that Greek food is varied and good as they don’t eat food from other cultures – don't bother trying to find an Indian restaurant in Greece (though there is a pizzeria in the local village).

Konstantina

Our elderly neighbour, Konstantina, only eats certain meals on particular days, e.g. it is Wednesday so it must be lamb and potatoes. And it must be cooked in the traditional way – our hosts remember inviting some locals and cooking a traditional meal, except she substituted sage for thyme. Some guests refused to eat it! And this is odd because Maria is an excellent cook. She provides a big lunch for us each work day, so we only have to find a light dinner for ourselves, and it really is a highlight. Plus we are lucky to have an endless supply of the best home grown olives, olive oil, jams and chutneys, and wine...and we pick fresh oranges from the tree half a minute from our front door.  Today, while we were sweeping the road in front of Konstantina's house, she invited us to pick ten oranges from her tree behind her house.  She speaks no English and we speak no Greek.  She stood at her window, showed us an orange, pointed to us, pointed to the orange then each of her ten fingers and thumbs and pointed to her tree.  We worked it out and many smiles and patting of tummies seemed to confirm we'd interpreted the conversation correctly.  One of many precious experiences!

We're not sorry to have left behind earthquakes in New Zealand, but it seems rather ironic that we've come to an area that has centuries of active earthquake activity.  So far we have not experienced any here.  Right now we find ourselves with Kalamata less than an hour's drive away.  Until we arrived here, the name Kalamata meant only olives to me.  I had forgotten I'd visited there briefly in 1985.  On September 13 1986 it was hit by a 6.0 earthquake.  A quarter of the population, of 40,000, were left homeless and more than 3000 buildings were destroyed.  Twenty people were killed.  We spent a few hours in Kalamata a week ago.  It was very sobering.  28 years after the earthquake there are still several half-standing old buildings in the main city streets.  You can walk up a lane between modern buildings and be met by a very old stone wall that blocks further progress - the area beyond is a shell, half covered with opportunistic plants.  In the suburban areas at the very edge of the 'CBD' there are old stone walls at the edges of modern apartments, empty sections with stone staircases leading nowhere, and hollowed out buildings being reclaimed by greenery.  Very sobering.

At work

At play

Our work here has been quite varied: sanding and oiling outdoor furniture; harvesting olives; investigating and recommending a new mobile phone; bottling olive oil; packaging orders for products; mopping out one of the villas here when it got flooded during a storm; sweeping; installing a plastic covering on the pergola to give extra outside workspace; feeding the cats while our hosts were away for a couple of days (which happened to coincide with the worst of the storms we've experienced so far).

The olive harvest has been particularly disappointing for the locals this year with most growers getting about 10% of last years crop, apparently due to adverse weather conditions at important stages of the growing season, and not helped by the storms that have seen many ripe olives knocked off the trees. Here, at the Icon Painter villas, last year they harvested 38 70kg sacks of olives.  This year we nearly got three and a half sacks!  It's very sad.

Both here and in Italy we've been spoiled with fabulous fresh extra virgin olive oils.  Nigel asked me the other day if we'll go back to buying cheap, tasteless extra virgin oils when we get home ..... not a chance!!  A good oil is so good for you and simply tastes great. 

And what would Greece be without cats everywhere?

Geia sas (Hello to Greece …)

Departing Italy was depressing, exciting, and surprisingly easy at the same time. Taking a comfortable and fast train to Rome was easy, and also cheap as we remembered to book well in advance when the few “special discount” tickets were available. Travelling with Aegean Airlines to Athens was a pleasant experience, it was the first time we had used mobile check-in and boarding passes, i.e. the details were on our mobile phones and these were just scanned in directly from the phones. No queues at the check-in desk nor at the gate where we were allowed onto the plane early for a comfortable and on-time flight. All was looking good.

And remained good in Athens where we hopped onto the express bus from the airport with 1 minute to spare after being almost first through the baggage claim and, of course, being the EU there was no immigration to contend with nor apparently any customs either.

Despite the rumours of recession and desperation in Greece, we were surprised to see numerous department stores and luxury car dealers on the way into the city centre. This was followed by the crowds we found shopping at the numerous shops within Athens over the next couple of days. We have to report that consumerism is alive and thriving despite what you may hear on the news! Later we were told that Greeks generally distrust the banks and tend to invest in property and land and keep the spare cash under their mattress, hence it appears that it is only the banks that are in deep strife here.

Like most big cities Athens is crowded and chaotic, and exciting and interesting at the same time. Our hotel was in a pretty working-class area (that might explain why it was so cheap – only 33 Euros a night), which meant loads of local cafes, rubbish, dirty, and major graffiti everywhere. The graffiti was generally very artistic and photogenic.

November is clearly the off-season as the tourist sites were very, very quiet – everyone must have been shopping instead. Even the Acropolis was quiet with no queues and it was even possible to get some photos without other people in them. The views over the vast – and very white and smoggy – city are spectacular. There is so much to see here, and not just the classical sites and museums (of which there are many), that we could happily have spent several more days here. It is as full of life as it is of shops, including one of the best-stocked photography shops we’ve ever seen. Recession? What recession?

We departed Athens via the easy-to-use bus station on a comfortable coach driven smoothly by a very un-Greek-like driver. The trip across the Peloponnese to Kalamata was very scenic and reminded me why a previous holiday here by bicycle some years ago wasn’t all that successful – the interior is very mountainous! There are a few classical sites to see along the way – the Canal at Corinth (if you’re not blinking at the time), some big stone walls surrounding the top of a mountain peak, and signs to the wonderful amphitheatre at Epidavros, if only you could stop. The smooth trip is aided by the wonderful new motorway all the way, and the very few signs of human habitation to be seen, apart from the huge cooling towers of the coal-fired power station at Megalopoli.

All good things come to an end, and ours was the three-hour wait at the Kalamata bus station for the local bus down to Koroni. Unfortunately the bus station is nowhere near the centre of town so there is nothing to do except sit in the rather good café and while the time away. This last stage of the trip was somewhat epic as we had a proper Greek driver at last. I was a little concerned with the speed we were going and taking the corners, often in the middle of the road, plus the driving right up behind any car before lurching out and overtaking it on the short straights. I was a little more nervous when I realised he was doing it all one-handed so he could concentrate on chatting to his mate in the passenger seat. Then he got onto his cellphone for a long chat which was marginally worse, but deteriorated again when he dropped it on the floor and spent the next 10 minutes fossicking under his seat trying to find it, all the while continuing to drive in the same fashion. At times like this it is best to concentrate on the scenery and your insurance …

We got off the bus at Harokopio (if you're looking for it on Google maps, try Charokopio - an alternative spelling they tried for a while to get non-Greeks to pronounce the name correctly), the nearest village to our new hosts at The Icon Painter. Michael and Maria were there waiting for us and took us to their local restaurant where we were ushered into the kitchen to choose our dishes, then back to a table to enjoy some wonderful food and lashings of wine. A very promising start …

Farewell Italia (again)

After the entire month of October at Baronci, near Florence, it is time to move to our next phase – Greece. We are very sad to be leaving Italy as we’ve met some wonderful people, seen some amazing sights, had some great experiences, and fallen in love with the place and lifestyle. But, then Greece has a good reputation too …

Santa Brigida, seen from Baronci

Firstly some final words about 
Baronci. It was similar to most of 
our other locations in that it was isolated in the countryside and our own transport would have been a great help to see the local area, so we really only saw the farm, the local town Santa Brigida (possibly the most boring town in Italy), the road to Florence, and Florence itself. Plus a day-trip to Lucca (more later).We didn’t get out and about into Tuscany as much as we had hoped as we didn’t have that many days off and the buses weren’t good, however the trips to Florence made up for that.  It was comfortable living and we ate well – Marina kept her bargain and didn’t repeat any meals over the entire month, except for a couple we requested from her. Like everywhere we’ve been to in Italy the wine was good, cheap, and plentiful. Marina and her two brothers, Vanni and Mimmo were always interesting company as they are well travelled (particularly Africa) and have a very good sense of humour. I particularly enjoyed Vanni’s autobiography of his time in Africa. Still not sure about the stuffed Condor though … Marina was very good to us, taught us a lot about Tuscany, and made sure we didn’t work too hard when the body developed some aches and pains.

Lucca

Our one side-trip was to the Tuscan town of Lucca. Though not as well-known as the nearby Pisa, it is one of the attractions of Tuscany. It is surrounded by a wall and contains many old towers, one of which you can walk up to get a view over town and admire the trees grown on the top! The central piazza in the town is oval in shape, surrounded by houses and shops. We also enjoyed an exhibition at the Lucca Contemporary Art Centre of works by Henri Cartier-Bresson, the French street photographer.

Autumn arrived while we were here. Though many days were hot during the middle part, we did need the fire lit most evenings and there was a lot of rain during October, often accompanied by impressive thunderstorms. The lack of sunshine was delaying the ripening of the olives so that we only managed a few days of picking and they were still mostly green. Luckily we did manage to pick enough to be able to go to the press with them and sample the outcome.

And we did see two red squirrels as well! 

Our final few days were in Florence, staying with Marina and her son Lorenzo. Marina took us out to a restaurant serving food from Naples which was divine. The simpler the pizza the better. Florence was, again, glorious, with so much to see and do. Our personal highlights would be:

• The walk up the 400+ steps inside the Duomo which first come out in a balcony inside the top of the central dome where you can stare down at the ants in the church or look at the amazing painting that covers the entire inside top of the dome. Then the walk gets even better as you carry on up and inside the two layers of dome – the dome is composed of one inside another, to keep it light and strong. The stairs lead between the two shells and finally outside to stunning views over Florence. Amazing.
• Art. Everywhere. Whether it is the buildings themselves, reliefs scattered about on the walls of buildings everywhere, the numerous statues, or the galleries, there is just too much to take in at once.

You can, and we did, spend days walking around the centre going ooh and ahhh ..

Olive Harvesting, Italian style

As we finish our time in Italy and head to the olive harvest in Greece, here is what we’ve learnt about the olives, Italian style. There are many different varieties of olives, some for table use, others for oil, but they all start off green and turn black when ripe. They are either used for oil or for eating, though we’ve only been to places where they are used for oil so far. The smaller olives tend to have higher oil content, especially when ripe. Typically they get between 10% and 18% oil by weight.

In our picking so far we have been getting between 10 and 20kgs per tree, which equates to about a one litre bottle of oil. Given the amount you are likely to receive for a bottle of oil, albeit top quality, and then think about the costs of the maintenance of the trees throughout the year, the effort to pick the tree, the equipment needed, the costs of using the press, the bottle … clearly it is done for the love, not profit. Most of the small olive farms are run by old people, so it is dying out. Commercial olive groves have a large number of trees, may use some form of mechanisation, and may even mix their olives with those from cheaper sources, e.g. North Africa …

Before clearing

After clearing

The clearance team

Fixing the nets

During the year the trees are pruned to keep their height down and clear of inside branches. Ideally the branches should spread outwards and downwards with fruit as EU regulations forbid climbing trees to pick them! Just before harvest time the ground is cleared underneath them, probably just a mow on a well-kept grove, but strimming and bramble cutting on the worst ones (like the one we’ve been at!). Another reason for keeping the ground clean is that the fallen olives are caught in nets, and these shouldn’t get tangled up in the undergrowth.  Due to the number of brambles on our fields – even the bits left over from a good strimming – the nets get holes in them, so the first task before picking is to fix them, just as a fisherman would.

Using the "Tickler"

On the day of picking the nets are rolled out, one on each side of the tree. Then the picking begins with a choice of tools: hands are popular, but also what looks like a child’s toy rake, with or without a handle. These strip the olives off the branches very quickly. Another tool looks like hair tongs. When pulled down either side of a branch it picks up all the olives. For the highest branches there is the “tickle machine” – think of a long pole connected to a car battery at one end and having two plastic forks at the other. The forks vibrate and, when pushed against the branches, cause the olives to jump to their death. Fun but the olives fly all over the place, not necessarily onto the nets. And holding the pole up for a long period is very painful on the arms. Actually, all the looking up at the branches makes for a very sore neck at the end of the day. When the tree is done the nets are picked up and the olives are poured into plastic boxes, less a few leaves and twigs and insects that get picked out. Apparently Tuscan oil requires a few leaves to add flavour …

Emptying the nets

Removing the rubbush

The crates of olives are emptied into what look like bed frames – wooded frames lined with wire netting. This allows them to air and dry as it may be some days before enough olives are picked to be able to go to the press. They can last a couple of weeks if necessary.

Original press equipment

Modern press equipment 

The press has to be booked and requires a minimum of 300kgs at a time. We were lucky in being able to go to the press with our first load. Though you book a time to be there it is possible to wait for hours as it depends on how many olives the previous people have taken. Often people have to hang around for most of the night awaiting their – overdue – turn. Once the season gets going the press runs 24x7. Each person dumps their olives into a hopper from which they find their way to a conveyor belt taking them first to have excess leaves blown off, then washed, and then into the press itself. They don’t start this process until the previous person’s olives have been pressed and the equipment washed – it would be terrible to mix your oil with someone else’s! Eventually the oil starts dripping out a tap and into your containers. The final step is to pour some into a plate and sit down with some bread, garlic and salt for a tasting.

Our olives!

Our olives – and the others we saw at the press – were mostly green with a sprinkling of black, reflecting that they were the first of the season to be picked. The green olives give the oil a stronger, peppery taste. And the colour! Bright green like spirulina or some of those concoctions of kiwi juice. The colour does fade after a month or so.

Being washed

The result!

Where we are, in the hills above Florence, it is about the maximum altitude for olives. They are less affected by an insect that burrows into the olives and spoils many and being completely surrounded by forest helps keep other insects at bay. Now Italians think their oil is the best in the world. Tuscans, certainly, think their oil is the best in Italy (as does every other region!!), and our host here at Baronci believes her oil is one of the best in Tuscany. So, have we contributed to the best olive oil there is? As a comparison, the brother of our host, Mimmo, has given us a bottle of a very exclusive local oil that is normally exported to the US. We’ll report back later on what that is like.

Tasting hot off the press

More "before" photos ...

But after ...