Road Trip In-Betweens

 

When "road trip" was brought up months ago we're not sure if this is what the girls had envisioned, but this is what we got!  The itinerary included a ride to the airport, a jump onto a Lauda Air (wasn't it supposed to be Ryan Air?) flight to Zagreb and then, after a few hours "on the ground", including a quick tram ride, walk around, a bit of spontaneous fruit shopping and dealing with a tourist trap type restaurant (though we managed to get a smile and conversation out of the waiter after a few attempts at breaking down the tough guy facade) and a bus ride to Llubjana before finding out "new home" for a few days!  

The girls were troopers. Sitting on backpacks (is't that a trademark backpacker move?), reading books, dealing with hour on hour of waiting for public transport, check in luggage, checking out luggage, working out local transport options on the fly, working with tourist maps of city downtowns, worrying if you're on the right tram, on the right bus, have the right ticket, etc. All part of learning how to maneuvre one's way through central Europe. Who knows?  Perhaps one day this will all be part and parcel of a typical summer, but for is this was an exciting (okay, sometimes not so exciting) meandering through Europe, just like we hoped!

A Beautiful Moment

 It was morning. Much earlier than daddy would have liked. But our flight was an early one and we were a good hour away from the (Thessaloniki) airport, in the friendly and, at this time, sleepy village of Vrasna. Irini had insisted on waking up just 15 minutes early to walk to the water and watch the sunrise. As luck would have it neither Amalia nor mommy would make it. And so the walk, in the slowly lit morning, was calm and quiet and slow. 

We made our way to the beach where the previous days there had been crowds and music and running children and the hustle and bustle of any tourist town in high season (and surely would be later today as well). But in this moment there was hardly a whisper. Only a slight swaying of water which, as we approached, we realized was the welcoming echo of light waves coming, going, ever so gently. There was hardly a wave, really. It is, as the Greeks say, oil. 

And with the calm we were drawn, of course, to the edge of the water, welcoming us to a gradually growing glow. The sun would make its way up over the horizon a few minutes later and we watched intently, allowing the moment to fill us with wonder, and hope, and light and the calmness of a very light breeze and that ebb and flow on water with nowhere to go. 

There are moments which you think might last only a short while, but which then seem to have etched themselves into your brain and, deeper still, in into your soul. This was just one such moment. Where the world called and we - thanks to Irini - listened, marveled and let it all seep in. 

Thessaloniki: Spirals

 Our summer was a bit different this year. The return to Greece for summer, after a while, provided us with a review of how we did summer. One thing that came up was the hope to have a 'road trip' feel to this particular summer and let things take care of themselves. We gave our girls a two week window and asked them to identify a place they'd like to go. When they finally sat down to look at photos (Google to the rescue) they decided - to daddy's delight - that Slovenia was 'on the list'.  And so we began a process of trying to find a reasonably priced way through central Europe before heading north and finishing up in Sweden (with Pappou and Moca). A pretty exhaustive research on potential flights, trains, cars, buses, etc. came up with a really cheap ticket from Thessaloniki to Zagreb. So it was only natural that both those spots would not comprise important connections on the trip. 

But Thessaloniki isn't just simply a stopping point. It's a point of family history. It's connections not merely in terms of changing modes of transportation, but also in finding one's friends and memories. And so Thessaloniki brought with it an opportunity to visit our good friend Gilly (some would call her a little sister!) and daddy's college roommate Aki (who was in the area for the summer). So rather than a off-the-train and on-the-plane change over, this portion of our summer turned into a two night - three day visit to Thessaloniki to see Gilly and her husband (as well as a day trip to visit all those places that giagia had mentioned in her journal) followed by a two-night stay in Vrasna (about an hour's drive west from the city) to visit Aki and his family (sister, mom and brother-in-law) and do the "Greek thing" including amazing conversation, incredible food and memories galore!

So there, somewhere between college stories and notes from giagia's journal, we were able to retrace our family's steps through downtown Thessaloniki (right down to the point where the hosts are done with us) and make our way across Macedonia to the beach. Life was good. Re-connections were strong. We love our friends, and family, and everything in between.