Greece

If you really want to know them, you'll have to read the previous entry, as that's more or less the only way you'll discover the contrived and roundabout way of why I ended up on a beach in Thessaloniki in the pissing rain about 1am for no apparent reason. The term beach might be something of a slight overstatement as well.

Having inevitably been delayed by an hour or so at the border (not my fault) and never having been to Saloniki before, I'd arrived in a rain storm, dashed out of the station somehow found the correct bus stop at about the third attempt and just about jumped onto the last bus of the night. As we careened through the city, it occurred to me that it might have helped to be slightly prepared. It could, for example be useful to have the name of the stop i needed to get off at written in Greek, rather than an English translation – or some knowledge of the Greek alphabet - which naturally didn't appear on the bus stops (actually, Greek names weren't even on all in a place visible to a passenger on a speeding bus in the dark in the rain). I didn't want to head up being turfed off the bus at it's terminus to discovered I was marooned miles - sorry, this is Greece: kilometres - from anywhere, even if the bus was heading for somewhere nice and homely. IKEA. But the usual combination of skill, logic, guesswork, experience and sheer dumb luck meant I even got off at the correct stop. Thus i killed a few minutes gazing out to sea and getting wet, before being met by Kiriaki [owner of the fashionable Women's clothing boutique “Dress-Antistress...” by Mitropoli, for anybody that may be useful to] who has formerly appeared in these tales of whatever as the mad Greek shopping girl from Bangkok. At that point, my day got immeasurably better (well, actually, it was well into the next day, but who's counting?) as we took the short trip back to the bar she'd just nipped out from and in the company of 4 lovely Greek girls, had a few drinks.

I'd come to Saloniki more or less by accident as an afterthought. Having decided not to stick around Bucharesti after New Years and with a prior appointment in Macedonia a couple of days later, I had decided to break the journey somewhere - I love Beograd but get to go to fairly frequently anyway so I'd decided against it. Istanbul was too far out of the way to make sense, my friends from Timisoara were away, Sofia held no appeal for an unnecessary stay and Plovdiv didn't help logistically. So I'd looked into Salonki due to the dearth of alternatives as much as anything else. I've not been to Greece for a number of years and have never spent much time there, and had only ever passed through Saloniki a couple of times by train, so it certainly had an appeal. Cheap accom looked tricky however, even after putting out some feelers. I only finally decided to head there when, somewhat sheepishly, three days after I'd started pondering this vaguely seriously it occurred to me that I actually know somebody from and living there. I can be a bl**dy idiot sometimes!

Sadly, I only had a day there (I'd lost an entire afternoon in the “why the feck didn't we stop in Sofia as supposed to” farce), but it was enough to get a feel for the place at least. The centre is surprisingly compact, user friendly-ish (if you get lost, just head downhill), pleasingly chaotic, and interspersed in the normal Greek way with large sites of remains and ruins. I spent the morning wandering around the central core and markets, before meeting up with a friend of Kiriaki's, Ismini and a few of her friends for a great Greek lunch in a locals place down an alleyway on the hill. I couldn't have planned it any better. If nothing else, this is a country with Bakeries full of exotic pastries on every corner (i love it!) and which eats lunch at the same time as me (2-3ish, none of this crazy Scandinavian 11am lunch cr*p). Even better, Ismini's friends included Antonos, a renowned Cretian reggae saxophonist. Lets face it: Just how many Cretian Jazz saxophonists have you met?!

After a good 3hour or so lunch, people dissipated in their own directions, and i went up. Saloniki is a city on a hill, and basically a huge maze of alleyways, cut throughs, and unexpected sights. You really have no idea what's around the next corner, and there are many many corners. It's reminiscent partly of Dubrovnik [not the fort bit] and partly of Napoli, and the kind of place i love. I had probably been wandering for about 45mins when i realised that I was at one with the world and perfectly contented. The big trip notwithstanding, I don't get to go to many “new” places these days, especially in Europe (because there aren't many new places, rather than the fact i don't see much of Europe). And here I was, walking randomly through alleyways of a city I've never been to before, knowing not where I was going or even where there was to go or not, with no goals or purposes except vaguely to keep going uphill (avid blog readers – they have another name: gluttons for punishment – may remember my love for, and periodic hill climbing phases of my trip) whilst listening to local radio (another passion) in the dusk and early evening.

I haven't been as happy in a long while.

A fairly dodgy and unexciting picture of an excellent city view

After a while i reached the old city walls and had a bit of an explore, before reaching my summit at the old prison/fort way up top. The last of daylight was well gone, and I spent a while sitting in the freezing wind on a prison wall, looking out over the lights of Saloniki. Absolutely great stuff. After a while, I reluctantly decided to get out of the wind and return to the city, spending another contented half hour or so doing nothing except picking random (mostly) downhill leading alleyways. Entirely undeliberately and in a way that i could never replicate or even find again, I even passed right by the same restaurant that we had lunched in earlier.

That evening i took a long walk out to Moni Lazariston (stunningly, I even found it without having more than a very vague idea of which part of the city it was in, and none about how to get there) where i spent a pleasant evening drinking cocktails and wonderfully large measures of whisky [Greece is great for spirit measures] with Kiriaki, the barman and two female Bulgarian high court judges – connections like this are always useful to make - and celebrating the imminent wedding of our friends Sam and Desh in Thailand (I had met Kiriaki originally through them).

We've since heard that despite the 7am start, it all went brilliantly, so I'll end here with a quick congratulation note to Sam & Desh verylongsurname, and wishes for a long, happy and successful marriage.