Levsos, Chios & the long way home

We are in Wales! After almost 24hr travel with bicycle,ferry, taxi, plane and car we made it home to Tim's parents.
The last few days in Greece were great. What a lovely finish to a fantastic trip.
First there was a bit more chilling out on the beaches of Levsos...

Then we took the ferry to the island of Chios where we stayed in the beautiful B&B of family Topakas.

After a idyllic breakfast in the courtyard we loaded the bikes one last time...

...and rode the 40km over the inland hills of Chios to get to the island's second Port in Mesta.

We passed the pretty village of Armolia, famous for its colourful pottery...

...and the picturesque town of Pyrgi with steep winding streets, painted houses and sundrying tomatoes hanging in the door frames...

We then boarded our last ferry to Lavrio and finished cycling with a final total of 4349km. What a trip, it'll still all have to sink in. We shall do a final sum up when we reach Scotland.

Sunrise,Tzatziki & an island or two

The last couple days we cycled from Kavala to Thessaloniki using the old main road along the coast. We are now on puncture 14! Other then that we thouroughly enjoyed our roll along the sea - with some hills, some tourist villages and with warm but not too hot weather - Lovely.
We rolled past vinyards, sugar cane and cotton fields.

Now and then archeological sites and monuments appear along the road like this impressive 1600 year old lion statue,which is the "Lion of Amphipoli" build in honour of one of the admirals of Alexander the Great...

We enjoyed watching the sunrise at breakfast...very romantic indeed.

In Thessaloniki we hopped on the overnight ferry to Levsos....see below about to land in Mytilini, the main town of the island.

We chilled out in the harbour and will move on tomorrow night to the island of Chios before taking the last ferry to Lavrio,on the mainland SE of Athens and then heading for the airport...
We are slowly trying to ease ourselves into the fact that we are in our last few days...

Puncture Perfect!

So, here we are in Kavala. After the highways of Turkey we headed for Dadia forest nature reserve, host to 36 of the 38 species of birds of prey found in Europe. We stayed at the eco tourist centre which has rooms of hotel standard for hostel prices. Very nice.

The staff however seemed little disorganised and uninterested. We decided to forego the minibus trip to the hide with 'Stavros' and cycle up. Glad we did, others were shipped out with barely a chance to unpack their binoculars...

We spotted some Black Vultures, Griffon vultures, Egyptian vultures and various types of eagle. The WWF play an important part in monitoring the birds and regularly provide donkey carcasses to supplement their diet. With the abundance of food you can pretty much turn up any time and be guaranteed to see the birds.

Onward to Alexandroupoli and we decided to hit the smaller roads through the mountains and were rewarded with fantastic traffic free roads and stunning views.

Had to keep an eye out for the tortoises mind, could have caused a bit of a surprise dismount. These two were having a bit of a lovers tiff involving lots of shell biting...

Back to the coast between Alexandroupoli and Maronia, passing a number of ancient archaeological sites including a small amphitheatre, cemetery and watch tower.

Not satisfied with the roads of Mongolia we decided to do a bit on the gravel tracks. Got a little more than we bargained for, very steep and rocky and would certainly have been impassable by car. Just the way we like it...

We arrived in Maronia to discover the camp site we had spotted on the internet did not apparently exist...Ah well, the only accommodation we could find was a 4 star hotel, so we had to make do...

More coastal riding to Fanari and back to camping by the beach.

As always food is never far from our thoughts. A delicious tuna, feta salad ala Sara...

Yet more interesting wildlife at the Vistonida Lake. Here a pod of pelicans...

Punctures, punctures, punctures. Unbelievable...After having only 3 punctures up to day 80, the Greek roads seem to be throwing their best at us. Here Tim repairs puncture no. 9 in a single tube over a period of three days...glass, thorns, wire...you name it, we've managed to ride over it...

Arrival in Kavala and time to work out how to get to Athens in 5 days and take in a Greek Island or two...

Bye Bye Turkei - Where are the big birds?

Today we crossed the Turkey - Greece border at Kipi and it's just as hot on the other side. The last few days have been good. From Silivri we cycled the main road towards Ipsala and sampled some rather croweded and noisy campsites.

But who cares as life revolves around food and after the last 6weeks we thoroughly enjoy long, tasty breakfasts - yammm..

Yep - we both now have matching sunhats, sunglasses and Birkenstocks! Marital behaviour has definitely fully set in - doh!

Couple of days ago we met these chaps, Henry and Jamie who are on a 18months adventure from London to Sydney - they are riding to raise money - check out their website and donate here. Thanks for the Greek map guys!

So we cycled on in hilly Turkey on small and main roads and we were granted an entire! day with tail wind - nice!

Then we ended up on the Autobahn - Motorway in Greece. Photo below: We just had climbed the fence to the right as our little road just stopped so we had to continue on the motorway - that was a first (and hopefully a last).

Now we are off to Dadia Forest Reserve to check out some Big Birds - apparently 36 of the 38 European Birds of Prey come through this migratory path - see what we can see....