Day 52: Off to work

This morning the girls discovered the unalloyed joy of a luxury buffet breakfast – and I eventually left them all to it so that I could go back to the room and prepare for my first day of work for some time. Then it was off to interview the resort's general manager, a very friendly Frenchman who had spent time working in Port Douglas, which is very close to one of my PhD study sites in north Queensland, while Kate and the girls had a buggy ride off to the resort's other indoor pool. We all then drove out to the Navarino Environmental Observatory, a research station set up by the resort, where the others went for a walk along the beach while I interviewed the station manager. 

Work duties dispensed with, we all then set off to do some sightseeing. First was Voidokilia, an amazing semi-circular beach with a very narrow entrance to the sea that's framed by rocky outcrops. Behind the beach is an extensive bay and wetland, where we were delighted to find quite a large number of flamingoes enjoying their winter holidays. We then drove into town for some supplies and then out to Golden Beach, which runs along the bay, where we had a picnic by the water. We also checked out a bird hide and hunted around, unsuccessfully, for an Africa chamaeleon – there's a colony of them around the lagoon, the only one outside Africa.

On the way back to the resort we stopped off to have a look at some Bronze Age tholos tombs - impressive chambers sunk into the ground by the Mycenaeans in what is now an olive grove. This little archaeological adventure inspired us to go in search of the Palace of Nestor, a much more extensive site up in the hills. However, we didn't have a proper map and Sally didn't seem to know the way either, and we spent a very frustrating time driving around aimlessly. We did eventually pick up some signs and stumbled across the site, only to discover that it was closed until 2015 as they put a new roof on.

So it was back to the resort, where we all went for a swim and then Kate and the girls took a yoga class – a private class as they were the only guests who turned up. Dinner was at the restaurant at the resort golf club, which required another buggy ride – a little luxury that still gives the girls a thrill. After dinner, we wandered around the resort a little bit more, gawping at the grandiosity of it all. 

Day 51: On the road again

With another early-morning departure looming, the last-minute packing and cleaning once more kept us awake until far too late – this time we got to bed around midnight for a 3am wake-up call. But we were on the road by 3.30am and in Ermoupolis not long after – with plenty of time to spare to get on our 4.20am ferry to Piraeus. Which was a good thing. We've become used to catching the ferries to and from Normandy, which are very well organised – check in here, queue there and wait for someone to guide you onto the ferry. In Greece it's a little different. No signs, no people, no idea. So we drove to and fro for a while, asking people who hadn't a clue where we were supposed to be and what we were supposed to do until the friendly lady in the ticket office directed us back to where we had been at the start.

The ferry duly arrived and we duly drove the car on and then trudged around looking for somewhere to rest our weary heads. As Syros was the final stop on a long journey through the Greek islands, space was at a premium, but just as we were about to give up all hope, we miraculously managed to find two sets of four seats around two adjacent tables, enabling us all to curl up and catch a few Zs. Kate did the best, sleeping for much of the four-hour crossing, which was a good thing, as she had the driving ahead of her. I woke pretty early and spent the last hour or so beginning the impossible task of removing all of the cat hair from my fleece.

As we were one of the last cars on, we were due to be one of the first off, but when the time came to return to our vehicle, Kate and I realised that we hadn't paid any attention to where the car actually was. Luckily Zoe was on the ball and directed us to the correct level.

Now, over the past few weeks, I've been trying to arrange a press trip/commission for a story about a five-star resort called Costa Navarino in the Peloponnese. It all came down to the wire, but I managed to pull it together in the end, and it was there that we now headed. As previously, we drove through some very dramatic landscapes on the way there. I hadn't really appreciated just how spectacular a lot of Greece is – and it was frustrating to have to try to catch these incredible scenes through the window as we sped past them.

As we approached our destination it was nearing lunch time, so we stopped off for a bite in a little taverna by the water. We then headed for the resort, but we had one more stop to make before we got there. It turns out that in Greek 'zoe' means 'life', and on the way to Costa Navarino, we passed Hotel Zoe, which had her name spelled out in great big letters out the front - so of course we had to get a photo. 

When we reached the resort, we were stopped by a guard at the gate. Luckily, my name was on the guest list and we were ushered through into another world. Pulling up in front of the hotel itself, we were greeted by name and asked if we would like the valet to park our car. We declined, but by the time we had done so ourselves, a buggy was waiting to ferry us and our bags back to the front desk.

From then on, the girls had permanently bugged eyes, as we were escorted to our luxury suite, with its two enormous tvs, one of which was set above the jacuzzi at the bottom of our bed, which looked out over the golf course to the ocean. Their eyes then achieved a whole new level of bugged-ness as they ran back in from the deck to report that they had spotted a guest in a room below enjoying his infinity pool sans swimming trunks. Kate took them off for a swim of their own in one of the resort's two indoor pools while I had a quick nap, then we all had a lovely buffet dinner in one of the restaurants.

Say goodbye to Syros

Our final few days on Syros passed in a bit of a blur. On a few afternoons I went out on my own to do a bit of photography – tramping about the hills shooting big landscapes and small flowers. While we've been on the island, the hunting season has been under way – rifle cracks echo around the hills on a fairly regular basis. Apparently, they're shooting the little migratory birds that are stopping off on their way to Africa. On one of my wanders I managed to take some long-distance shots of a hunter decked out in camo gear with his girlfriend, in tracky dacks and a fluoro-pink backpack - following dutifully behind. 

That same afternoon, as I was heading home, I spotted a big, all-too-tempting piece of black rubber lying flat beside the road – the herpetologist in me immediately identified it as a potential snake home. And it was! Curled up underneath was a gorgeous little viper. Of course, I wasn't properly kitted out for photography, but I managed to get a few decent shots. I went back a few days later and turned the rubber over again and it was still there, allowing me to get a much better series of pics.

By now, Johannes was returning the favour to Yannis, helping him to harvest his olives, and I spent a few hours over a couple of days helping out too, which enabled me to get a few nice olive pics (and a collection of tired muscles).

We also had a few social occasions to attend – coffee and cake with a British ex-pat called Sandy, who has a house with a huge terrace and amazing view over Kini and the beach, and a sumptuous lunch with Flora and her landlords (and their dogs and cats...). And we had dinner at the only taverna still open on the beach, where a helpful Greek-speaking Welshman translated for the waitress – the restaurant had a menu in English, but she couldn't back-translate them (we had to order the 'split peas just married' – and very nice it was, too). We chatted to him afterwards and he quickly identified us the Australians looking after Jacky's place.

Day 48: The good oil

In the afternoon, Johannes came by to collect us all and take us down to Syros's olive press to see his harvest being turned into oil. Just as we were about to leave, however, I noticed that one of the cats, a timid little calico by the name of Lovely, wasn't in a good way. She had been sick for a while and had been making some horrible hacking noises over the past few days, but now she was huddled up in one of the boxes mewling pitifully. Kate gave Flora a call and she asked us to put Lovely in a cage so we could take her to the vet later.

Once we had caught her, we set off in convoy and were met at the press by Johannes's nephew (whose name, I think, is Yannis), who quickly set about helping Johannes to get the olives out of his little car. The press was a hive of activity, with various locals coming in with their olives and leaving with their containers of oil, all watched over by a random cast of grizzled characters whose connection to proceedings was unclear.

Both Johannes and Yannis gave me a description of how the process works, but what with the din of the process itself, my understanding was somewhat tenuous. In essence, I'm pretty sure that it works like this. The olives are first emptied into a big hopper, from which they are drawn upwards by a series of little 'cups' on a conveyor belt. This then dumps them into a machine that sucks out all of the leaves. Next, the olives are washed and then mashed up into a paste, which is heated and churned to get all of the oil out. The oil is then put through a centrifuge to spin away all of the water before emerging from a spout and pouring into a big collecting tub. All the while, the pulp is dropping onto a big ever-growing pile outside, later to be used as fuel to heat the apparatus or as mulch. Johannes was delighted with the results – his one and a quarter tonnes of olives yielded about 200 litres of oil, of which he gifted us three litres. 

The finished product: this year's oil front and right, last year's to the left

By the time we got back to the house it was getting dark, but there was still the matter of Lovely to be resolved. So, I stayed back at the house and cooked dinner while Kate, Flora and the girls took her to the vet – who was apparently rather shocked at the state of her and decided to keep her in overnight.

Day 43: The beach, reached

When Flora heard about our thwarted walk to Varvarousa, the next beach along from Delphini, she suggested that we all go there for a picnic. So this morning we headed out with Flora, Egle, Flora's neighbour's daughter Maria and a combination of Flora's and Maria's dogs.

This time we took a path that started in the Delphini car park and took us straight up and then along the hillside – much higher up than the path we had taken previously – and after a quarter of an hour or so we were standing on the ridge looking down on Varvarousa. The track down was steep and a bit slippery, but we made it down pretty much without incident. 

There's an old hut on the beach that was used by fishermen for the odd overnight stay, and we sat here to have our lunch, then we spent some time skimming stones into the ocean before heading for home.

At Flora's request, we've started to photograph all of the cats that come to the house to be fed and use them to create a cat-alogue. Some of the cats are newcomers, so this evening we sat around coming up with and then endlessly debating names for them. When the document is finished, I'll upload it so the cat lovers among you can flick through it and gaze at the glory of our feline menagerie.