The Mani

Forts, Feuds and Figs

By Where's Herr Gruber?

April 17^th, 2021

Kalimera!

Sun is out, temperature is rising and we are back in our campervan! Before Greece went into lockdown on November 7th we had already discovered a fast part of the Peloponnese. However, not the Mani. A rugged, dramatic, mountainous and rocky region. Nothing grows here, except for some olive and fig trees. So you can image the Greeks were not enormously excited about living here. Count in feuds and fight between family clans and what is left is a sparsely inhabited part of Greece, ready to be explored!

Before we made it to The Mani we stopped in Pylos to spend some lazy days at the beach, do some veggie shopping and eat some Gyros pitas. We also got Jenny’s blood tested at the vet in Pyrgos for Rabies antibodies, we need some certification in case we leave the EU and enter it again. It would be nice to not leave our dog behind, and apparently a EU passport for dogs does not open every door, as the one for humans does…

Koroni

From Pylos we drove to Koroni, where we found an old school local bakery with yummy bread. It was a cute town and we can image in summer, and in non-pandemic times, it must be alive and buzzing. Unfortunately, that day it was quiet and empty. We desperately hope that for the upcoming summer season the small family-owned restaurants, shops and guesthouses are allowed to open up again.

Waterfalls of Polilimnio

Next stop were the waterfalls of Polilimnio, which were beautiful. We discovered that Jenny is part mountain climbing goat. Which was fine until we saw some signs that people were dragged to dead by the river and waterfalls in the past… So from then on she was a mountain climbing goat on a leash.

The Eastern Mani

Finally entered The Mani and just drove and drove along the coastline of the Eastern Mani, no one is sight, not a single car passing. Lot’s of goats though. We drove through seemingly empty villages, it wasn’t clear if the houses were just abandoned or waiting for the pandemic to be over before their owners, probably now living in Athens, would come back to enjoy the summer months in less urban environments.

We made it to the most Southern point, apparently the second most Southern point of the European mainland, and stopped there to camp. Right next to the entrance to Hades, the Greek underworld… We survived the night, didn’t got dragged into the world of the dead, and hiked to a cool old, but still functioning lighthouse. Along the way passing the Temple to Posseidon, which still had the original mosaic. Really cool.

The Western Mani

Back up via the Western Mani, which was a bit more populated and we saw more people there. We did another beautiful hike to an old castle and church in ruins, at the Tigani peninsula. And we saw a lot of typical Maniotic villages tower houses. Some are still intact or renovated, some are crumbling. Which brings us back to the feuds between clans. Since nothing grows from the rocky earth of the Mani, people got a bit understandably greedy and fought over any land that might be fertile. To protect their families the clans build tower houses, which were basically family forts. The wars between the clans were fought out with two objectives: destroy your rival’s tower and kill all the male family members. Must have been a great time to be alive…

From there we drove all the way up again and parked at the beach close to the Olive Farm, had some lunch on the beach with Charlie, Ellie, Lexi and Rob, washed our clothes and had a proper shower, thanks Charlie and Ellie! By chance we met two German couples with dogs and off road campers as well, and we made camp two nights at Elea Beach. Which was really fun and it felt really good to just have company again, dinner, beers and just some social interaction with anyone else then each other ;-).

Saying goodbye and leaving the Peloponnese

After saying goodbye to Charlie, Ellie, Lexi and Rob once again, and this time for real… we drove straight through the mountains of the inner Peloponnese, where Herr Gruber drove through some rivers and our feet did not get wet. So that test is passed as well. We drove over the Corinth Channel, were we saw some old German bunkers which looked really scary and a bit apocalyptic.

At the moment we are standing at a beautiful bay, trying to make a plan for the next coming weeks. Tourism is opening up after Greek Easter, May 2nd, but we are doubting to go to either Turkey or Bulgaria and Serbia. Let’s see, we have time. For now it is great to travel in Greece during spring, flowers and trees are blossoming everywhere, making the air smell so sweet. It is beautiful and life is quite alright at the moment…