Photos from Alec's Greece Trip; Days 6-8

While we knew ahead of time that the group would be traveling around we also knew that their main "hubs" were going to be around Athens, Thessaloniki, and the Isle of Rhodes with day trips taken from each of these hubs. I never knew when/where they were traveling though and it really sounded like they slept in a LOT of different hotels. So I really can't say where many of these were taken. Sometimes I also don't know what thing they visited first on each day so they might not be in the correct order but I did the best I could. 

Saturday the 20th they visited another winery, a museum, a bakery and got some culinary time in.  

olive tree 

Museum:

Modern city of Sparta 

The random animal/plant photos made me smile as that is totally Alec! He said this was the first calico cat he'd seen on the trip. Though he did have other random cat photos he took.

Since Alec was not a fan of visiting (and trying!) all the wine at these wineries he thought this next dish made at this winery would have been delicious without the wine so he often hunted for the lighter color pieces of bread that had more oil than wine on them. They take a thick biscotti textured bread and break it into bite sized pieces by banging them together and having the bread act like a hammer. Once the bowl is filled with mostly uniform(ish) size pieces you pour wine over it, olive oil over that, and top with fresh herbs. 

 

bottling equipment

bread slices for the dish

The finished product

(out of order photos) pouring the wine over

They visited a huge bread making facility

stacks and stacks of huge cases of flour

bread proofing room

Grocery carts filled with breads of all kind. 

this large planter near where they ate dinner was filled with baby tortoises 

Father's day I woke up to these photos he sent. He did say the giant tour bus had been winding it's way up the mountains.. and I did not envy that tour bus driver. Between most stops they were on the bus from anywhere between an hour to three hours... particularly long was the day the bus driver took a wrong turn and since there is no way to turn around on these tiny winding roads for the huge charter bus they just had to find a new way there. 

goat herds

another pretty cathedral he was trying to snap from the bus

national uniform

A small local school house:

the bell used to ring to signify the start and end of the school day

the teacher slept/lived at the school and the families/students/town provided all that the teacher needed as far as food, fire wood, etc. 

the school house; their tour guide here was one of the last student classes to still use this building

Such incredible views! 

gardens used by a cooperative of woman that started a business trying to entice local young people to stay in the area and not all migrate to the larger cities 

Inside the co-op

outside the co-op

This is just a pretty town they passed on the bus. 

 They visited some more ruins and across the street was a large museum with a cobblestone courtyard. Inside the museum was all the statues and partial statues that they had discovered in the surrounding areas (like the one above and all these below). 

 

a partial statue of Nike

he loved this adorable planter

This was the first time they saw any water that wasn't part of the ocean; though they do think this was still brackish as they were near the ocean

 The photo of Alec IN the ocean are from a town called Nafpaktros and since he said their hotel was on the water I know where these photos are from. 

this dog never strayed from his spot near the door to the hotel they were staying at. 

 

A close up shot of the pebbles and he snapped a quick photo of these duck houses he saw right in/over the water. He did see the actual ducks too but not in the photo. 

Others in this series:

Days 1-3 here

Days 4 & 5 here

Days 9-11 

Days 12-14 

Days 15-17