Collingwood

​… and so Collingwood are out of the 2022 race for finals glory. ‘How does Old Groomby feel about that?’ I hear you ask. Well, ‘Old Groomby’ (if you must) is very pleased with his team’s, and club’s performance. 

This time last year we were in the depths of despair; as low as we could get; in the slough of despair; at our beam’s end.  17th on the ladder and sinking fast. Who could have imagined such a turn around?  

In 2022 we have a coach who cares about more than winning, a team who care for each other and their supporters and a prospect of more glory into the future. [Straight out of the Ted Lasso playbook, only his is only a fictional character.]

And to lose by only one point!  After being so very down, derry-derry-derry down down at three quarter time!  Lots for Old Groombles to be pleased about. 

What about next week?  Well, who cares, really?  Geelong will win, of course. There is no doubt about that. It’ll be a rort. Sydney playing on the wide open spaces of the MCG and Geelong a much stronger, more powerful unit than any other team in the league. Sure we’ll go through the motions next Saturday and the lead up to it, but the Cats will win by a country mile. Good onyer, Bloggs!

So there are my thoughts. A splendid Collingwood season and I look forward to 2023. 

Go Pies!

[Of course it is not a good thing to emotionally invest so much in the outcome of a game over which one has no control. My friend Andy can attest to that. He has no such attachment - lucky sod!  However, for such a club as Collingwood there is so much family attachment and childhood recollections for me that there is no denying how much it means to one’s very being. No escaping. Just roll with the punches …]

Toodles!

Comments anyone?

​It would be grouse if youse would offer a comment … just so’s I know someone is out there ….  Just a teency one …

Interesting Intersections

​This post is dedicated to random personages who happen to appear in one’s orbit as one travels life’s highways (or in a train). There are countless others, but one needs much quicker access to one’s iPhone from one’s pocket and the opening of one’s camera app to capture all of them. Forgive me. 

This glamorous lady shared a carriage with us while we hurtled to Glasgow from Arran. 

Another lady. This one in Angelina’s hot chocolate cafe in Paris. 

This lady appeared to be an ‘influencer’ in the Luxembourg Gardens. Lots of glamorous photos. 

Intense young chap on the Metro. Deeply absorbed in his phone. Look up a few minutes later and he’s gone!

Tattoo studio in Santorini. Full view from the street. 

‘Like that lucky old son, with nothing to do but roll around heaven all day …’ and chat on your phone. 

Just saying …

Toodles! 

Greek Island Ferries

​You have to take your hat off to your Greek Island Ferries. Their steadfast plod through the Adriatic Sea brings a certainty to inhabitants of these islands that gives them a strong sense that they don’t live on islands at all. Cars and trucks move easily on and off the ferries all day long. Big trucks, ‘Uge’ trucks and all sizes in between. Haven’t seen too many scooters on the ferries, but there are heaps of cars, the queues of which are never very long and everyone waits his or her turn to get off and on - a model of patience and cooperation. I must get some photographs of Greek Island Ferries in action. 

Three cheers for Greek Island Ferries!  Hip hip!

This is NOT a Greek Island Ferry, but a Greek Island Ferry is just about to tie up the other side of this jetty and take DJ and I to Milos. 

Toodles!

Milos

​The island of Milos was formed through volcanic action and is basically a huge crater lip, much like that of Akaroa in New Zealand. Milos is a MUCH bigger island than Folegandros and is much busier. We won’t be able to see all of the island this trip because we don’t have a car. This morning we set off walking to the bus station at Pollonia, just down the road. €1.60 each per trip is good value, but the time gap between buses is astronomical. Careful planning is required. [You are getting a good whack of blog space because of this.]

So, bus back to the port to catch anothery to Plaka. More gorgeous tiny-street-window-shopping and wandering before climbing to the tippy top of the hill in the centre of town. Up another few flights of interminable stairs to the summit. We were greatly rewarded, however, of magnificent 385 degree views of the island. 

Climbing down the other side of the hill we chanced upon an ancient Roman theatre which is old AS!  Round there somewhere we’re some catacombs, but we were thirsty and hungry with all that climbing, so repaired to a restaurant for lunch.  Slumping gratefully ont the chairs and perusing the menu, we suddenly realised that we’d miss the next bus if we had lunch there, so hastily left for the terminus and shouts of apology to the gaping restaurateurs. Forgiveness may have been conveyed to us - we can only hope - but we were out of there and off to catch a bus. 

Now for a little story …

One day, a very long time ago (1820, in fact) George Kontrotas was digging in his field on Milos. This is what George Kontrotas did. He was a farmer. Digging is what farmers do. They dig. [Just ask Oz.]  It was then something happened. Maybe George dig into his toe with his digging implement. WHO KNOWS?  In any event, George looked down and (to his immense surprise, saw a 3-dimensional representation of Venus. A PERFECT (it was thought at the time) image of ‘woman’ herself. Woman personified. 

It’s not clear whether George Kontrotas was rewarded in any way by his find, but somehow this Venus from Milos (‘Venus de Milo’) was sent to some French king in gratitude for deeds done in the defence of Greece, where she now stands fully protected from the elements of weather and George Kontrotas’ mates who would inevitably have hacked off more than her arms as mementos of their proximity to her. [Or maybe that’s being more than a little unfair to George Kontrotas and his chums.] 

Toodles!

To Milos

​Our host lady had said she’d take our luggage down to the port in time for our departure and so we headed off in our car for a visit to the only other beach with restaurants and shops down thd hill from Choros. Yet another gorgeous Greek Island beach. FJ headed in for an ‘old lady’ swim (no getting the hair wet) while Groombles got into his book.

 Just along from where we sat was a beach one can only access by wading. Soon came a wading doggie from round the corner. A cute doggy. A cute doggy full of very wet water in its coat. Time slowed to a imperceptible crawl while nature took its inevitable course. DJ and I knew what would happen and it did. The cute, gorgeous coat-full-of-seawater doggie let fly well within a mètre of us and shook for all it was worth. We hadn’t waded to the other beach because we would have got wet. We were now as wet, but had a ferry waiting fo us to head to Milos, so off we tootled. 

The ferry trip was quite the worst we had ever lexperienced, being in some sort of jet-propelled catamaran thingy where we had allocated seats and no possibility of walking about decks (or anywhere really) until the vessel was docked. No fun at all!

Anyway, here we are at Milos. More to follow …

Toodles!

Greek Island Life

​No photos in this blog, because it’s mainly about toilets.  One repressed memory of being on Samos on our last holiday to Greece was the prohibition on putting any paper whatsoever in the toilets.  Yes. Can you believe it?  NO. PAPER. WHATSOEVER. ‘So how does that work?!’ I hear youse exclaim. Well, first you ‘go to the toilet’ and then you do some careful wiping and then … wait for it … you carefully fold the paper and drop it into the bin provided by your hosts. 

This process takes some getting used to, I tell you. One’s natural (and trained) reaction is to drop the wiping paper into the dunny. At this point, on Greek islands, you have to be STRONG and not go where your inclinations take you.

 We had been on Samos (last trip) and had thought that our normal toilet process would not be discovered. Of a sudden, however, came a whooping from the domestic cleaning person. She had discovered that the bin by the side of the toilet was EMPTY. Either the Australians in number 5B had been ‘holding on’ for three days OR they had not been doing the right thing. We ashamedly admitted to our transgressions and immediately sought forgiveness. This was accepted, and we went about our business (so to speak) in the Greek Island manner. 

Same rules re toilet are extant on Folegandros and now Milos. BE WARNED!

Toodles!

Odd thing

​The odd thing about losing the first Folegandros blog is that the photo from it appears in the Dreaded Lurgi post. How odd!

Folegandros

​People seem to do a lot of trudging on Folegandros. While the port is down near the gently lapping water (where one would expect it to be), the main town, Choros (‘Horos’), lies a-top a hill in the middle of the island. People trudge up and down, even waving on tourists (us) eager to please by offering a lift in their hire car.  

The island is 12 km in length and the daily hire rate is €30 per day, so who wouldn’t get a car at that rate?  [Filling the car at the end was a bit of a cruncher, though - 23 litres @ €2.29/litre.  No alternative for only three days on the island though.]

DJ’s choice of accommodation was again brilliant as we were in the port town, right on the beach. Minutes only from the morning dip in the clear blue waters. 

The town of Chora perched on the edge of a sloping escarpment which, viewed from a distance, makes one wonder how residents and tourists alike aren’t slipping off to their doom on the rocks below on a regular basis. It all looks very precarious. After you park your car and wander into the town you soon see that there are plenty of places to safely wander and lots of grabbing points if you suddenly start slipping. Tiny, meandering streets of cafes and tourist shops. Brilliant white paint, with sky-blue trimmings. 

We went to a remote beach one day that was only accessible by boat or a long trudge up a huge hill and then plummeting down a sheer rock face to the destination beach. We took the latter option and walked. Having driven a short way from our digs, we parked and began our trudge through the most barren of barren lands. The way was dotted by really ancient, abandoned, stone cottages - a sea of broken dreams, one might say. 

There was one recently completed house where a bevy of workers seemed to be clearing the yard of massive amounts of rocks. Quite an unenviable task. We trudged on, not offering our assistance. 

Down to the cliff face to the beach and into the briny sea again.  Cooling off before trudging back up again. 

The food on the island was a mixed bag. A fish restaurant at the port was good value, as was a meal of goat in a ‘traditional’ restaurant at the north end on the last night. The slow-cooked goat was very tasty and came in a lovely local pasta-type base. For lunch yesterday I asked for sardines, which were not available and got some very rubbery squid/octopus instead. The salads are always delicious, however. 

Here’s our beach (to finish this blog):

Not quite the finish, because here’s an arty shot of DJ with a gorgeous smile:

Toodles!

[Ewan has been right to chastise me for the falling-off of blogs, but yesterday - on the ferry to Milos - I wrote this blog. However, somehow it COMPLETELY DISAPPEARED. As usual, however, the second writing of a piece (like when you lose a university assignment) is MUCH better than the original. So here it is. Thanks Ewan!]

Deaded Lurgi!

​Difficult to know, really, but whether it is COVID is difficult to determine given that we left the test kits in London. Nonetheless, I have been smitten with some sort of Lurgi. Having wandered along the Seine and up again to the Palais du Tokyo we returned via Metro to our joint near Rue Mouffetard. The plan was to have our last Parisian meal together at a little Italian restaurant nearby. I had been feeling less and less like my good-old self, but by the time I sat down with DJ at the chosen restaurant I was dead beat. Out of it. Stuffed!  I made my excuses and désolés and we backed out without ordering. We had booked for 7:30, but that was never going to happen. 

Feeling much better today, I am well in the way to making a speedy recovery. Wheeew!

The trip to Folegandros by plane from Orly or to Santorini was all one would expect. Last night in a small hotel and then up at Sparrow’s to catch a taxi to the port and on to Folegandros. I was expecting seasickness, but this, mercifully, didn’t happen. 

It’s another gorgeous Greek island, your Folegandros. A cab met us at the port and delivered us to our digs. Here we are, all set for some stunning adventures in the morning. Let’s see what happens …

Toodles!