On The Road

Kalymnos

We arrived in Kalymnos, in the port town (and main city) of Pothia on Thursday morning around 3:30am. We wanted to get to Masouri, on the other side of the island, about 8.5km away, but the bus wasn't going to start running for another 4 or 5 hours. We wandered around a bit, looking for a place to perhaps get some sleep, and managed to pick up a small retinue of stray dogs. We found a spot behind a church, sat down on our inflated thermarests, leaned up against our backpacks, and tried to sleep. After about ten minutes of listening to the dogs fight and chase cats, taxis and mopeds roaring by every few minutes, we knew it was a lost cause, so we decided to walk to Masouri (taking a taxi was out of the question, as (a) we're too cheap, and (b) the object was to kill time until places started opening up, and a 5+ mile hike with our packs would certainly do that).

We headed off down the road with a couple of our loyal new friends in tow. We tried to discourage them from following, but I guess we aren't mean enough. One of them gave up after we got to the next town over, but the other stuck with us the whole way. We got to Masouri around 7 and found a cafe that was open and serving breakfast. The cafe owner promptly shooed our now displaced friend away.

"Climbers" seems to be the magic word in Masouri. Our cafe owner was excited that we were climbers, as her son appears to be one of the founders of climbing in this area. We told her that we were looking for a place to stay, and she took us across the street to a very nice hotel run by a friend of hers. As we approached, we told her that it looked much too fancy for our budget, but she waived us off and after a few minutes talking with her friend, came back and asked if 15 Euros/night was ok. We were ecstatic, as the going rate for most places seemed to start at around twice that, and we had a large room with huge balcony overlooking the sea. (I think part of the reason we got such a good deal is that we are here pre-season, and their rooms are usually booked in blocks by package tours. But having a connection certainly helps here.)

We spent our first day (Thursday) catching up on sleep and walking around the area. Yesterday we got up early and went climbing.

Climbing is fairly new in Kalymnos, the first guide book having been published only a few years ago. They are clearly looking to gain recognition as an international climbing destination. The municipal government even has an official climbing information center in Masouri. They have markers on the side of the road indicating where the path to each climbing area starts. The path itself is marked by spots of color painted on rocks along the way. Then, believe it or not, the names and ratings of each climb is painted onto the rock at the start of the climb. This would certainly horrify a lot of environmentally-conscious climbers, but it is nice when you're as bad as we are (well, I am) at finding climbs.

The climbing yesterday was fun, although the area we were in had some very sharp rock. The climbs themselves are very well bolted--often not more than 5 or 6 feet between bolts. Encouraged by this, Jacqueline led a couple climbs, including a 6a (about 5.9/5.10).

Our climbing today was thwarted by rain--the first since we've been in Greece--so we headed to Pothia to see the town in daylight. The sun's actually out now, so hopefully we'll be back on the rock tomorrow.

We're not sure yet how long we're going to stay here...at least a few more days, possibly longer if we don't get kicked out of our hotel room by a busload of German tourists.

Hope everyone is well. Take care.

-b & j

Posted by brad at May 24, 2003 02:35 AM