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The latest news & weather from Symi, reported by Adriana Shum from 'The Symi Visitor' office. Adriana's Greek Recipe of the Week>> Symi Report; Monday June 28th
Still waiting for
the telephone technician, alas.
It
is very hot on Symi and likely to become steadily hotter
as the week progresses. Even the wind is warm at the
moment and the island is drying out rapidly. Doors
and shutters rattle and woodwork creaks and groans as it
shrinks in the warm dry air. Doors that had to be
kicked open a few months ago now blow open if they
are not double locked. There is a gentle rustle and
swish as crisp leaves fall from the summer-deciduous
trees. The almonds shed their leaves to conserve
moisture for the ripening nuts and the vines will soon
start to jettison excess leaves.
Sections of the road
between the windmills and Chorio are closed at the moment
as trenches are being dug to lay new water pipes and
excavators have been chattering away from early morning
until the siesta every day for over a week. Huge
piles of sand like mine dumps have appeared at strategic
points along the way so concrete mixers will, no doubt,
follow the excavators. This is one of those projects
that has been on the municipal job list for so long we had
all forgotten about it and it was rather a shock when they
finally got round to it. Sections of the water
system were replaced last year which greatly improved the
water pressure to parts of the harbour and we hope that
this latest round will do likewise for parts of Chorio as
some areas really struggle on 'water day'.
Symi Report; Friday June 25th
In the new office at
last. I don't know how much work will get done
between watching the boats through the windows and gawking
at the griffins on the ceiling but presumably the novelty
of our new surroundings will wear off soon enough.
It is weird to suddenly have so much space.
We are still waiting,
at time of writing, for the OTE to complete our telephone
installation. At present we can go on-line but the
telephone line connected to the ISDN drops the link
everytime anyone uses it so there is a loose connection
somewhere and the 72755 number was disconnected from our
old office on Wednesday and has yet to reappear on this
side of the harbour. Thank goodness for mobile
phones! Meanwhile, if any of you out there want to
contact us, please email!
There's certainly
plenty of activity over on this side of the harbour.
The mindless thumping of pop music from the downstairs
gyros bar in our old location has been replaced by the
rumble of the Navy's generators when it is lying alongside
the quay (when it tooted to announce its departure this
morning the windows rattled!) and the bustle of vehicles,
people and boats going past.
It is a lovely sunny
day on Symi. The water is flat as glass as the
afternoon breeze has not started yet and the first of
the excursion boats, the Kallisti, has just docked (see
latest webcam
shot).
We're now knuckling
down to produce the July edition of the Symi Visitor so I
know what we're doing this weekend. Have a good
weekend, planning your sunshine holidays and looking at
the rain...
Symi Report; Monday June 21st Sigh. As the OTE has not moved the telephone lines I am still camping in the old office which is a bit of a bore. The telephone/fax looks very sad, sitting on the floor. At least they left me a desk, chair and computer... And the webcam so you have a new shot of the multitudes admiring the ducks. Or perhaps they were listening to a sponge talk but they were definitely looking in the direction of the ducks... Or perhaps the ducks were listening to the sponge talk too.
By the end of Friday my
rain gauge had recorded half a millimetre of rain. Nothing
much to write home about. In other parts of Greece
it was a different story, however, with widespread
flooding up in the north and a river burst its banks and
flowed through the rural town of Kilkis. If the place name
sounds familiar it is because that is where it rained fish
a few winters ago. A passing tornado swept up a
shoal of mackerel and scattered them over the town. Of
such things are myths made.
It is warm and breezy
today. The tamarisks and hollyhocks are swaying
gently and the flags on the bridge are flogging themselves
to bits. A big boat has just docked and a pick up truck
perilously laden with toilet rolls has wobbled past.
Symi Report; Friday June 18th This week was very very hot with temperatures hitting 38 on Tuesday and Wednesday and 40 yesterday. This morning we woke to violent gusts of wind from the south west and flurries of rain, most of which evaporated before it hit the ground. The squalls have continued all morning but should improve later today. The sun is out now.
One of the harbour's
new attractions is a family of about 50 ducklings which
has been released into a penned off area by the bridge.
Apparently they are part of a clean up campaign. Children
are standing on the bridge at the moment, tossing lettuce
and bread to them. The arches have been fenced off to
prevent anyone accidently quacking out into the road. The
cats are not impressed at having their favourite fishing
spot out of bounds.
As I write this there
is a great deal of activity going on around me. I am
sitting at the last computer at the last desk in the old
Symi Visitor office and workmen are staggering out with
various bits and pieces, trying hard to avoid colliding
with the wash basin at the foot of the stairs... Looks
like I'll be having a shorter walk to work next
week. But how long it will take for me to remember to turn
off at Villa Afaia and come down the Lazy Steps instead of
carrying on down the Kali Strata could be an indicator of
how long it takes to learn new tricks.
Symi Report; Monday June 14th Symi is sizzling away merrily in the first real heatwave of the summer. We are expecting temperatures to touch 40 in the next day or so. On Sunday morning when I made a brief foray half the population seemed to be heading up the mountain in search of cool breezes and the other half was heading for the sea. Scrambler bikes and Vespas bearing whole families, inflatable toys and all, were to be seen on the Pedi road. It is unusual for it to be quite this hot this early in the year and some regular visitors have been caught rather by surprise. Certainly the hiking boot brigade are not as conspicuous as they were a week ago and it is unusual to see anyone on the move in the midday sun unless absolutely unavoidable.
The solstice is only
days away and it is light until about 9 pm. There is
not much bird movement during the hottest part of the day
but in the evenings and early mornings there is a
great deal of twittering and swooping among the swallows
and the owls are much in evidence. The birds are not
the only ones making the most of the abundance of insect
life at this time of the year. The spiders are
spinning webs between the trees and growing fat on all the
mosquitoes and flies. The cats are too hot to bother
chasing lizards and spend their days slumbering beneath
the lemon trees. The lizard population is happy with
this arrangement as by the time the cats wake up the
lizards have retreated under the stones for the night,
their tails perfectly intact.
Symi Report; Monday June 7th Well, Neil and Viv survived the long journey to Symi and are happily settled in their 'shed'. They came into the office this morning. Sorry no picture but the camera was out on a mission when they came in. Fortunately Viv had hers with her so all is not lost. We hope to co-ordinate an all singing all dancing webshot at some stage before they leave.
We had a rather wild
Saturday with intermittent mud showers and some mean
squalls that sent all the boats in the harbour jangling at
intervals. Fortunately it blew itself out on
Saturday night and Sunday was perfect. Not a ripple
on the water and visibility down to only a few kilometres
in the haze. It is still very humid but the clouds
have disappeared on the back of a westerly breeze and the
air is clearing. It is likely be windy again on
Tuesday, improving on Wednesday.
Symi Report; Friday June 4th
It has been quite
humid this week with festoons of low cloud lingering
over the hills in the early mornings and fluffy
tablecloths rolling over Nimos and the Vigla in the
afternoons. There have been quite strong catabatic
winds in the afternoons, enough to cause hectic activity
among the yachts at anchor in Pedi. We have had some
interesting looking vessels in the harbour too - including
a colourful square-rigger from Ireland, named 'Father
Murphy'.
The Greek Met office
keeps forecasting showers but this seems to be optimism on
their part as we have seen nothing apart from the usual
purple and white thunderheads building up in the distance
over Turkey in the afternoons. It is full moon and
we may have some strong winds this weekend. The
water level was very low in the harbour this morning and
the local cats were fishing on the weed-covered pilings of
the bridge. Small crabs and stranded tiddlers batted
about by skilled paws.
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