Vivid Hues and Vertical Views

Chrysanthemums outside the Symi Flower shop this week.

Bright yellow nets on the quay, seen from the balcony of the Symi Visitor Accommodation office.

Bright yellow nets lighting up a lane off the Kali Strata.

Whoever chose the paint for the bollards in Yialos colour-matched them identically to those fishing nets.

No, it isn't the sphinx on the roof of the Stani patisserie next to the Symi Visitor Accommodation office. This time it is a man cleaning up the plaster work on the pediment of the tin smith's shop in Yialos which is currently undergoing extensive restoration.

Only a cat can explain why a narrow ledge is a better place for morning grooming than the terrace behind.

Lemonitissa church overlooking Yialos from the kastro.  That is the Vigla, the highest point on Symi, in the background. Lemonitissa studio and apartment are just to the right of the church, among the trees.

The goddess Pallas Athena (Minerva to the Romans) on the roof of a jewellery shop in Yialos.

The newly restored customs house is proving irresistible to pigeons.

For those of you pondering over the reference to access to a train station on the Symi listings for booking.com, this is the reality of that fanciful promise. Symi does not have a railway.  It has a noddy train that runs to the hill above Nimborio and back for tourists during the summer.  Singing along to 'Zorba' while clapping your hands to the music is optional.

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Sizzling Symi

Yialos and Harani, Monday 8 a.m.

Yialos and Harani, Tuesday 8 a.m. As the heat haze builds, the monastery over on Nimos is fading away.

Monday morning in Yialos.  The Pentecost bank holiday long weekend but very few boats in comparison to previous years.

The Customs House is nearing completion. The office furniture and fittings for the duty free shop arrived on Friday and are now inside.

The view from the balcony at Symi Visitor Accommodation just after 11 this morning.  Symi is very quiet for the third week in June and all the businesses are down on last year, which was down on the previous year and so on.  Even the excursion boats don't seem to have many people on them so Rhodes must be quiet too.

As Symi's shoreline is mostly steep cliffs very little level land is wasted and in the harbour the buildings are tightly packed. There was never a tradition for horse-drawn vehicles here on Symi so the lanes are very narrow in places.  The balcony on this building almost overlaps the awning of the greengrocer opposite.  Note the washing line - no one is coy about hanging their washing out  in the street here and sunshine is free.

We may all be flagging in the on going heatwave but the grape vines are going mad. This one on the Kali Strata is heading up the electricity lines.

Free range hens taking advantage of a leaky water pipe in Lieni.

The heatwave rolls on and Symi continues to sizzle in the 40s.  The rocks are soaking up the heat, turning Symi into a giant storage heater and it was over 30 degrees at midnight last night.  Extreme heat conditions are normal in July but rarely start this early, in the third week of June, so it is going to be a very long hot summer for the Symiots. The air is thick with haze and visibility is dropping by the day, as you can see from the first two photographs, taken 24 hours apart.

Anyone with any sense is under an umbrella on the beach or lingering in the air conditioning at the bank or supermarket.  Now that we have air conditioning in the office we have noticed that those who pop in to say 'hello' show a marked reluctance to leave again - and who can blame them?

Have a good week.

Regards,
Adriana

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Symi Summer Solstice Sunshine

The Blue Star Paros whizzing into Yialos on Wednesday morning.  It is quite nice having a big boat that is actually fairly punctual as the Diagoras was often very late. People living in the harbour may, however, be heartily sick of 'Fur Elise' by the end of the summer!

Getting the tiles on - the customs house is rapidly taking shape.

It is the Greek Pentecost long weekend and power boats are starting to arrive from Rhodes for the holiday. 

An enthusiastic grapevine at the top of the Kali Strata.  

One of the hundreds of small rural chapels on Symi.  That is Pedi bay shining in the background.

Not a thing of beauty but I thought you might be interested to see one of the realities of Symi life.  This is the water supply box at the end of our road, fed by the pipe from the reservoir at Agia Marina.  Each of these pipes snakes off to a small holding in the valley, including my own.  When our pipe was connected there 15 years ago there were only 4 pipes being served by this supply point and when the water was on we got a reasonable amount. Now, as more and more people are returning to the land and making use of their family plots, the number of pipes has increased to what you see now.  Unfortunately the supply to that point remains the same so the pressure has dwindled to a trickle for those of us uphill of this point.  In theory we are supposed to receive water three mornings a week.  In practice what we receive is negligible as water flows most readily down hill, to the plots lower down in the valley. As it was a very dry winter this year our cisterns were never completely filled from the roof and we are already about half way through our rainwater harvest so at some point we will have to speak nicely to our various down hill neighbours and ask them to all switch off their taps one water day so that we can get our ration.  Symi has no natural water source and in the summer the water supply is a combination of the small desalination plant on the Pedi road and occasional shipments from Rhodes where there is a spring.

St John's wort in Lieni

And finally, a photogenic Symi sunflower.

Symi may still be unusually quiet considering that we are halfway through June but it is also very hot and it is unmistakably summer.  We had some late red rain showers and strong gusty winds on Tuesday as the tail end of the weather system that caused floods and storms in the Western Mediterranean blew itself out over us. The thermometer is rising steadily now and is currently in the mid to high thirties, dropping to around 22 degrees at midnight.  Symi's rocky landscape is soaking up the heat like a storage heater so night time temperatures will continue to rise and are often around 35 degrees in July.  A major heatwave is forecast for the whole of Greece for the next few days and some parts of Greece including the mainland and Crete may see temperatures in the forties.  If you are desperate for some summer sunshine, Symi is the place to be!

Have a good weekend.

Regards,
Adriana

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June Postcards from Symi

Iroko window frames in place and the work on the roof continues - work on the restoration of the customs house is continuing at quite a pace.

The ply sheeting and waterproofing are in place.  Next step will be battens and tiles. That is Lemonitissa church on the Kastro mound on the right and you can see the remains of the old windmills along the crest on the left.

For those of you who haven't been to Symi before, this is the head of the harbour, looking towards Mavrovouni.  The water taxis and excursion boats leave from the quay along the right hand side of the photograph. The Symi Visitor Accommodation office is set back, next to the tall yellow building with green shutters on the left which houses Pachos traditional cafeneion.

What shall we do today? Take a round the island trip on the Poseidon or a water taxi to the beach?

The Noddy train having a check up.  I have it on good authority that what is under the hood is actually a Suzuki Jimny!

Sunflowers in a garden in Chorio.

Herbs and petunias outside the Symi Flower shop in Yialos.

In all the years I have lived here this is the first time I have seen this building at the top of the Kali Strata with its shutters off.  My camera isn't good enough but glimpses through the windows reveal an interior that hasn't changed much in a century, complete with the traditional ornately carved salon mirror and paraffin lamps.

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A May Monday on Symi

A promising sight - men on the roof of the customs house.

Workmen have been clearing debris from the gutted customs house building and plans are being made to facilitate reconstruction as quickly as possible. This building is not just a Yialos landmark - it is important for clearing people - and goods - coming in from Turkey and it also effectively the local representative of the Greek tax authorities.  The local customs man is also responsible for apprehending foreign licensed vehicles that have outstayed their 6 month duty-free stay.  A lot of paperwork will have gone up in flames along with those bottles of whisky, vodka and Chanel!

The water taxis are now all in place for the summer. The boats in the foreground are part of a flotilla of speed boats that came over from Rhodes for the weekend. The Symi Visitor Accommodation office is tucked back to the right of the cream double storey with the light green shutters on the waterfront.

Ambulances in this part of the world don't always have wheels.  This high speed marine ambulance was part of the flotilla. I haven't seen this one in Yialos before as medical emergencies from Symi are often evacuated by the coastguard boat or by helicopter if there isn't a ferry departing soon.

Then there are the flotilla yachts, chartered out of Rhodes, Kos and sometimes Marmaris.

Fresh produce on Symi is usually sold from the crates and boxes in which it arrives - no prewashed prepacked  preprepared veggies and designer fruit here.  Every so often all the empties are loaded onto a truck and sent back to Rhodes market by ferry.  This one is ready to go on the Symi ferry this afternoon.

A large Turkish gulet, chugging off into the sunrise this morning.

Not everyone wants to tie up at the quay, even if there is plenty of room. It is much quieter to swing at anchor in Harani.

We now have a third ATM on the island.  This one, belonging to Pireus bank, is between the pharmacy and the jeweller on the south side of the harbour, convenient for the taxi rank and the bus stop.

We seem to be fast approaching 101 uses for a dead traffic cone.  This one is bonding with a petunia in a harbour planter.

Oleanders by the high school.

The rain yesterday was heavy enough to make the Kali Strata flow, leaving a trail of pomegranate petals adhering to the new whitewash.

After a surprisingly wet weekend the sun is out and May is back on track with calm seas, sparkling sunshine and lots of activity of a mainly maritime nature.  The weather will be windy but dry for the rest of the week with temperatures in the mid to high twenties.  The Symi Visitor Accommodation office has been quite busy this morning as many regulars to the island come in for a chat, even if they have not booked their accommodation through us this time.  We will soon be switching to summer time office hours but at the moment I am still only in 3 mornings a week. The joys of internet mean that we can answer your emails from wherever we are so just because we aren't 'here' doesn't mean we aren't working :-)

Have a good week.

Regards,
Adriana

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It's All Happening on Symi

The view from the Symi Visitor Accommodation balcony this morning. The Blue Star was very late - it is supposed to come through at 7.30 a.m. on a Friday and this photograph was taken at 9.25 a.m.  The knock on effect is that she will be late doing the Kastellorizon trip today and so will be similarly 2 hours late leaving Rhodes this evening.  

Symi is very steep and rocky so there isn't much earth for gardens in the conventional sense.  Instead locals create gardens wherever they can with assorted pots and containers which also have the advantage of being portable so they can be moved into shadier locations as the summer heats up.

One of the two butchers in the harbour.  You will note that this is the second bicycle you have seen in recent posts.  Symi is too steep for bicycles in the usual run of things and it would take a determined mountain biker to commute from Chorio to Yialos and back again on a daily basis but they are quite popular for getting around the harbour.

Wednesday morning and a burst water main on the Kali Strata.  Visitors to Symi will notice a maze of black plastic pipes leading up and down steps and lanes.  They are quite vulnerable as they are above the ground but it is not permitted to dig up Symi's historic Kali Strata so above ground they remain. This is the system for transferring water from the various tanks and reservoirs to the households of Symi.  Each house has a cistern or tank of some sort for the domestic water supply as the mains is not on continuously.   Symi is a famously dry island with no natural water beyond the winter rains so what water there is comes either from a rather erratic desalination plant on the Pedi road or by water ship from Rhodes.

The big excitement of the week was the fire at the Customs House in Yialos late on Wednesday night which gutted the buildiing.  Those of you who follow us on Facebook will have seen the dramatic photographs of the flames.  Symi does not have a fire brigade and in the absence of pressurised mains, we also don't have sprinkler systems that kick in automatically when there is a fire. By the time the fire was spotted it was well out of control, despite the efforts of municipal workers and the coastguard.  There is, however, a lot of talk about how a building that is surrounded by the sea on three sides could be destroyed in this way.

The steel shutters survived and would have contained the fire to some extent and the 60 cm thick stone walls appear undamaged, as is the sign! The flags are also in good shape, just a little sooty.

It seems that the fire started with this Smart car, parked in the courtyard of the Customs House.  The fire spread to the motorbike next to it and then through the adjoining window.  Unfortunately that room is the duty free store, full of bottles of duty free alcohol and perfume so there was plenty to feed the flames and the roof caught very quickly. That is the fish market on the left.  The wood of the market is charred but the copper sheathing on the roof has held and protected the fish market to some extent and the local fishermen were selling their catch as usual this morning. That looks like a coffee pot of some sort tucked in the corner on the right.  One of those Symi enigmas. 

It is a gusty day on Symi and we have had occasional sprinklings of red rain.  This is the last remnants of the wet weather system that was over Iberia earlier in the week and it is likely to remain unsettled and showery on Symi for the weekend.  Temperatures are in the mid to high twenties so it certainly isn't cold.

There is a lot of activity on the island now and just about everyone who is going to open this year has done so. Regular visitors may miss Mylopetra as apparently that has closed for good and the owners have retired. Some shops have closed, some have reinvented themselves, others are completely new ventures but generally speaking everyone I have spoken to is quite optimistic that although we have had a late start once again, it should be a good year.  Greece is a very safe country and islands like Symi are far from the political protests in the capital.  Even the recent 4 day general strike had little impact on Symi.  If you are looking for a peaceful holiday destination where you can just relax and do nothing much in particular, soaking up sunshine and Greek island life, Symi is the perfect destination.  One of the joys of not having an airport is that mass tourism has passed Symi by and as the architecture is protected the beauty of the island remains unspoiled.  Symi demands a little effort from those who visit her. She isn't that easy to get to and you may have to climb more stairs than you are used to, but Symi's regular visitors will tell you that it is always worth the effort!

Have a good weekend.

Regards,
Adriana

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