We woke up, feeling a little sad to be leaving Nauplio. So we may have sat on the rooftop terrace a little too long.
We were trying to get directions from there to Sparta and it turns out that we drove from Nauplion to Tripoli to Sparta. We had driven down part of that road from Tripoli to Sparta in 1989 to see a World War II memorial along the road.
Before leaving, I made Mike take pictures of the stairs from our room to the terrace, just to have proof that I had climbed them! (I'll post them on another page.) The photo below shows the building our rooms were in...bottom floor, lowest building...on the alley.
We entered to a small room with a table and the bathroom off to the side. Then up stairs to the bedrooms. Those stone steps go up to the other buildings and to the rooftop terrace which you can see at the top--the awning over the terrace. Stairs and more stairs. But we loved it.
It was about a 2 hour drive from here to Sparta, and was kind of weird to just drive through Tripoli and then Episkopi and Kerasitsa, but we knew we were coming back there to see the relatives. We finally made it to Sparta which is a relatively large town/city. We just drove through Sparta to the town of Mystras to get an idea of distance. We thought we would go back to stay in Sparta but after driving most of the way to the fortress and turning around to come back, we stopped at a place with sign “Rooms to Let” that we had seen on our way UP the hill.
This picture was taken later and shows the approach coming DOWN from the fortress.
We didn't realize that everyone used the town square for a parking lot or we would have pulled in and parked! So Mike sort of pulled over as much as he could and Elena and I jumped out and went in but we went in on the bakery side (decided we must go back and buy diples! they look so good!) so the women at the bakery took us over to restaurant.
A young women comes out and I ask for a triple? Yes, she says they have one. 45 euros! So she took us to see it and we said fine and she left—saying something about come around with ID after we get bags. So then we do pull in to the square and turn in to tiny alley to park the car. We brought the bags in and washed up and then went to eat at the restaurant.
So much for staying in Sparta!
We didn't eat at the tables showing in the photo above, but when we went in the front door, we saw there were tables on a side patio so we sat out there.
Ordered tomato salad,
tzatziki (yougurt, cucumber, garlic, dill) local sausage,
melitzanosalata (eggplant salad)
oh, and bread and water. Does it get any better?
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| Note the olive pits! |
We went back up to our room for a bit and then back to the car to drive up the hill and see the fortress.
When we got up there, I realized it was going to be more than I could handle to hike up to the top, so I passed on this one. Mike and Elena hiked up and back in an hour or so and I waited in the car in the small parking area.
That’s me down there in the dark car to the left of the row of red things piled up.
When Mike and Elena came back down from the fortress/palace, we drove partway back down the mountain to the monastery and “town” or walled city. I walked with them around to the “front” gate and I did enter and went up just a little bit, but it was so steep, it made me pretty nervous and a bit dizzy. So I wimped out and went down and back out through the gate and sat on a low wall to write in my journal. It was very pleasant and peaceful and I could have stayed for hours if it had been a tad more comfortable!
Here are some pictures that Mike and Elena took:
It’s pretty incredible—a fortress, a palace, a walled city with fortress and monastery and churches.
I don't know if Mystras is listed in many tour books--we didn't really study tour books for this trip--but it is worth it to spend some time here. Just go to Sparta and then turn west. There is something magical about it...maybe it's all the battles fought here to control the land. It has Byzantine, Venitian, and Turkish occupation history. Just make sure you wear good shoes for hiking.
By the time they finished and came back to find me, it was late afternoon. Probably 5 or 6 PM. So we drove down and back to “Rooms to Let” and more resting.
Elena and I went in to the bakery to check it out because I had seen diples in the display window so we had to get some and also some kourbiedes!! We ate one diples right away! Yum…
We decided to eat “early” but thought we shouldn't be too early so we “promenaded” around the town square trying to build up some appetite and ended up back to same restaurant to eat. There were a few choices and normally we would spread our money around, but we really liked "our" place.
We ended up eating and then sitting for hours.
(As usual, we get our mezes: great white beans, moussaka, chicken with potatoes, roast pork with crispy skin, salad, fried cheese, bread, wine.)
It was great entertainment to watch the town from our table…all the old Greek men sitting around the square…cars pulling in, right into the square…people jump out and run into market or bakery—especially after bread gets delivered. A truck pulls in and a guy jumps out and walks around with bags of cucumbers…the little daughter of waitress(?) or bakery lady(?) or someone---sort of being watched by everyone until papa (apparently) comes home from work. He is a fireman, based on the fact that he’s wearing fireman’s gear!
And then they brought ouzo to the table, so we had to drink that!
Finally, we decided we'd better get some sleep because tomorrow is the BIG DAY. We'll drive back to Tripoli and then meet the RELATIVES!
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