EXPLORING PAROS

Tuesday, November 13^th, 2007 Off to the marble quarries….

Slept in a bit later than yesterday; breakfast was oatmeal again along with the rest of the hard bread. Hung up the clothes outside again, this time with clothes pins and then took them down again an hour later before heading for the grocery store after I’d sketched out a map from the main road to the house for Jim. He gets lost at the church corner.

We found Margarita and Haris’ grocery store by the name of Anoussakis Market, located in the center of town on the main road. We introduced ourselves and they remembered Julie and said, “such a nice lady”. And I was right, that was not “Harry” on Sunday!

Purchased about 60 euros worth of food that should last us until we leave; they had a good selection of American products. Found another Skippy’s peanut butter to replace the one we’ve been using, toilet paper, paper towels, nuts, bananas, eggs, etc. Even found some frozen shrimp. But, didn’t find any frozen English muffins for Julie.

We headed back to the house for a couple of hours to give the laundry time to dry outside before heading out again about 2 pm this afternoon to find the spring for water and see the marble quarries used by the Greeks and then the Romans. It is known for its translucent qualities and was known as Parian marble and was considered the world’s finest. One example is the statute of Venus de Milo carved between 150-140 BC; one of the most important works of art in the Louvre Museum in Paris France.

Took the laundry back inside before leaving, it’s nearly dry and it still looks like rain is a possibility. Headed north towards Marpissa to find the “spring water” that is free and drinkable; followed Julie’s instruction and turned off on the road towards the St. George Monastery. We followed this road all the way to the top of the mountain and didn’t see any wells. By this time we felt like a mountain goat as the road was the width of our car, deeply rutted (very few roads are paved we’ve discovered) and extremely steep. Jim reminded me that all of our weight and traction was in the back of the car so we could start slipping backwards at any moment! We finally called a halt to this quest and turned around. We’d decided to purchase our water at the store.

Near the bottom of the hill we saw another road and took that one. It led us into a canyon and we found the dam with water in the spillway; but definitely not drinkable. Back to the road…still not paved…past the turkey farm; here we stopped for a Kodak moment as I think this is as close to a Thanksgiving Turkey as we’re going to see this year. Nearly back to the paved road we spotted what appeared to be a water well. Sure enough, inside the well was a pump and over to the side was a faucet just as Julie said there’d be. And looking off the road we saw the Monastery that provides the free drinkable water for the village. We’d driven right past it on our way up the mountain as it was hidden from view on the way up by a small building. We filled our empty water bottles that we’d brought with us and should now have plenty of drinking water for the rest of our stay.

Headed back into Marpissa and took the road towards Lefkes; a town in the mountains near the center of the Island of Paros. There we had another Kodak moment of the magnificent Agias Trias cathedral; then we headed further down on the other side of the mountain towards Marathi and the ancient marble quarries that have now been abandoned. Jim’s sandal strap broke again as we walked up the marble path to the quarries; he shuffled along and we were able to see where the Parian Marbles were quarried in ancient times.

Back to the car and on down the mountain to the port city of Parikia where we hoped to find an open restaurant for an early dinner. Drove around and around and finally out of the city without finding anything. The Islands definitely do “shut down” after October. Decided to head towards the house and fix spaghetti for dinner after stopping at the store for fresh bread and the noodles that we’d forgotten this morning. Since it was only 4:30 and the store didn’t reopen until 5 pm we meandered here and there and ended up driving all the way down the road into Klyki. Found the beach with the boats moored in the bay and unexpectedly also found an open restaurant! Enjoyed a nice early dinner of pizza and then headed back towards Drios and home. It was dark by now and while driving along the highway we rounded a curve in the road and I yelled “COW”; much like Jamie in the movie “Twister”. Jim slammed on the brakes and stopped just inches before hitting the first cow whose eyes were looking inside our little car! There were three cows crossing the highway followed by an old man on a donkey and a very small dog trotting along side the donkey. Jim rolled down the window to apologize to the old man and he started shaking his long stick that he was carrying and yelling at us in Greek! We really were not speeding and I think we were more frightened by the experience that the old man….the cows hardly batted an eyelash!

Arrived home to all five cats crying for their dinner; guess they’re getting used to being fed. We’re going to enjoy our evening by reading our books. I’ve started a great little book that I found here in the house called “Tulip Fever” by Deborah Moggach. Jim is busying attempting to repair his sandal with our sewing kit just incase we don’t find a shoe repair shop tomorrow when we drive back into Parikia. And then he plans to read his book also. I can’t believe that the television has not been on once today! That’s a record!