Tristomos Hike and Beyond

Sunday, July 17, 2011—Diafani, Karpathos, Greece



Lazy morning. I got up late, ate a leisurely breakfast, and now am washing out some things and of course writing this. My plans for the rest of the day include reading and staring out across the harbor—if I can work up the energy to walk the five minutes it takes me to reach the harbor.


The reason I’m so out of it is I went on a crazy, long-ass, three-part hike yesterday. First I headed up the coast to a nearly abandoned village called Tristomos (only two families now live there year round). The main reason I wanted to head there wasn’t to see the village itself, but because the hike seemed like it would be really cool, which it was. The trail hugged the cliffs and high ridgelines along the northeast coast of the island and was spectacular: for a couple hours I zigzagged in and out of pine forests, scrublands, and bare rocky outcrops, all while the shining Mediterranean lapped against the shore a hundred or hundreds of feet below. I was so high up at one point, and in an area so few people travel, that I actually got to see a couple of the island’s rare wild goats (not feral ones, but the real wild ancestors of their domesticated brethren). The first one I saw was far in the distance; it was standing on a rock watching me. Then I got lucky and snuck up on one. Because the fact that he (or she—I didn’t get close enough to tell) wasn’t expecting anyone that high up and because I was down wind of him and he couldn’t smell me coming, I really surprise him and got within maybe thirty feet before he saw me and took off up the dry rocks to an even higher elevation. He was a beautiful animal, with long black hair offset by an equally long gold patch that started just below his neck and extended across his shoulders and down his sides. Comparing this regal individual to the domestic ones you see here is a telling experience, really makes you see how much we’ve degraded these animals, what becoming slaves of humanity does to them. The goats the people keep here are really dirty, nasty, stupid things—and we’ve made them that way! This alone might be a good reason to go vegetarian …


The trail to Tristomos eventually turns inland and heads thru massive dry valleys. Strewn throughout these valleys are the rock walls and linings of the old, no longer-used farming terraces and field enclosures. This area used to be a thriving agricultural center, but Greece’s many wars and economic issues over the last century or so has caused this place to be abandoned. Walking thru the lost world was fascinating, if more than a bit sad. So much life had been lived there, so many story were created that are now long-since lost. It reminded me a lot of western Ireland, of all the old farms there that were abandoned because of the potato famine and subsequent mass emigration to America and Australia. Like I said, this part of the day was fascinating, but not exactly pleasant, if you know what I mean …


Tristomos itself is really nothing exciting. It’s just a little crescent of buildings, most no longer in use, which line the shore of an amazingly protected little harbor that once was the main exit point for people and goods from this part of the island. Noteworthy, though, was the massive amounts of trash strewn about the waterline. Tourists who come to Greece, I’ve noticed, are really ignorant about the state of the sea that surrounds them. So many times I hear people raving about how “clean” it is. This simply isn’t true. Most of the year the beaches are heaped with trash, with human effluent that makes landfall from God knows where. As the tourist season gets going these beaches are cleaned up. Tristomos is a good example of what many places here would look like if this wasn’t done. While I’m on this subject of “clean” water, I can’t believe how uninformed so many of the travelers are who come here. The Mediterranean is extremely polluted in a chemical sense as well. It’s also become increasingly devoid of life; fish, crustation, sponge, seal and other stocks have plummeted in recent decades. Just because the water has a pretty blue-green tint and you can see thru near shore fools these people into thinking they’ve landed in some eco-paradise. This couldn’t be further from the truth. How can they not know this? (Or maybe they just don’t want to know.)


According to the signs, whose accuracy is questionable, it was just under 11 kilometers to from Diafani, where I’m staying, to Tristomos. So I was pretty burned out by the time I got there. I originally was just going to go back the way I came, but in Tristomos I saw I could pick up the trail to Avlona, which supposedly was only around 8.5 kilometers away. I decide to head for there, because it was still on my way home, more or less, I would get to see some new country (I could avoid the dreaded Grecian backtracking, which is such a fact of life in these islands), and I knew there was a place there where I replenish my water supplies (as usual I underestimated how much I’d need). This was arguably not one of my better decisions, for a number of reasons.


After a short jaunt along the edge of Tristomos’ harbor, the trail turned inland and because a stone-laden march thru the floor of a hot valley that was getting little in the way of breeze (the coastal trail I took in was nice and breezy, which kept things relatively cool). The heat, the pain-in-the-ass terrain and the fact that I’d already been on the trail for over ten kilometers made this part of the hike an unpleasant slog. It got even worse a bit later as the trail shot steeply up into the mountains, which like the valley was also largely blocked from the wind and therefore hot as hell. One funny thing did happen on this part of the trail, though. Throughout this area there are all sorts of abandoned stone shepard's houses. One of these was being used by a bunch of domesticated goats to escape the heat. I guess because I was downwind of them they didn’t notice me coming. The trail passed right in front of the doorway of the house they were using and when the goats saw me they panicked and began bounding out of the little house and into the surrounding fields. What made this funny is that there were so many of them. At least a dozen poured out of this little dwelling. It was like at the circus when a ridiculous number of clowns exit their tiny car.


Well eventually, after a seemingly endless hike, I made it to Avlona, where I headed to the town’s only café, where I guzzled water (I’d run out a few kilometers back), downed a much deserved beer, and ate a salad, all of which I was overcharged for (nine euros)—they’re the only game in town and they know it. Still the people there were nice, old women mostly it seems (most of the men and the younger people were probably working in the fields somewhere, or have left town looking for something better in life), wearing traditional clothing and giving off the feel that it was still 1858 or something. From there I began the hike back home, which, after nearly 20 hot challenging kilometers behind me was not much fun.


The best thing about this part of the hike was the fact that the sun was going down and things were cooling off considerably. The bad part was that it was getting dark and the one thing I don’t want to have happen to me here is to still be out on the high trails in the dark, which, depending on exactly where I am, could be dangerous. So I powered over the mountain pass that leads to the sea and then down the long drainage and made it to the main road with about twenty minutes of daylight to spare. Not much of note happened on this part of the trail, except, for the first time in my life, I saw a legless lizard in the wild. It was a little thing, probably less than three inches from head to the tip of its tail. It’s interesting that I knew exactly what it was the second I saw it. I’d read that, despite their superficial resemblance to snakes these things are easy to identify because of the way they move. This turned out to be the case. They simply don’t travel like snakes—they kind of wiggle side to side, like a lizard, except they don’t have legs. I wish I could have observed it more closely, but it was getting dark, and, like I said, I needed to get off that trail. So I let him go on his way and I went on mine.


I finally made it back to town at about nine-thirty that night, after heading out about a quarter to eleven that morning. So at at least 23 kilometers it was a more than healthy jaunt. Cool, but ultimately a bit much. And I’m paying for it today. I’m glad I did it, though—I saw a lot of things most people who comes to Greece never run across. Besides you can’t spend all your days on the beach—you gotta have a little variety even if it almost kills you …






I can’t believe how long I’ve been based out of Diafani—by the time I leave tomorrow it will have been over a week. I must have found something here I like, though, or I would still be around. Heading down to Pigadia for sure tomorrow afternoon. On Tuesday I’ll either take the ferry of fly back to Crete. The trips winding down—I can really feel it now. Just a few more things to accomplish and I’m done …


Notes:

Obviously this island is not as goat free as I'd thought. Still there are far fewer of these beasties per square mile here than on Crete. Still wondering why that is ...