Sunday 1st November

The start of another month and we were off early to visit Mystras, the ruins of a Byzantine fortress town perched on the hills overlooking Sparta.  Incidentally, Mike made me watch 300 a few nights ago so I could get a feel for the Spartans; I’m assuming they all looked as the actors did in the film, hence I’m a fan. Anyway, Mystras was pretty impressive, although I’m not sure it needed 9 churches and 8 chapels.  We were a bit churched out (again) by the end of it, although it was interesting to see the votive offerings left at the icons in the churches. The offerings basically consisted of images stamped on small tin tablets, the pictures representing the ailment of the individual who left it. So we mostly saw eyes, arms, legs, breasts, etc., but then there was the occasional odd thing like a house and a horse. Who knows... SPOT

After poking around Mystras for quite a few hours, we drove to Nafplio which is a trendy seaside town where all the rich Athenians go for the weekend. We found a Greek radio station to entertain us during the journey which played a great combination of cheesy English and Greek pop with a sprinkling of dodgy Euro songs. One particular song got my attention, the chorus of which went something like this “...later you can seem to be like a shining star, but I’d rather do you on the back seat of my car”. That’s 92.6 FM if you’re ever travelling in Greece.

We found a great campsite at Tolo which is a few kilometres down the coast, the major attractions being a plentiful supply of hot water and free wifi (our needs are simple these days). SPOT The campsite owner really liked the Land Rover and asked to take a picture for the website - fame at last. We found ourselves camping next to Tatin and Noemie from Argentina who run a guesthouse there and invited us to stay, so we may have to swing by Argentina on our way home.

Posted by Anne.