Auto stop – Leonidio to Kosmas
By Helen Grubner. Filed in Uncategorized |
Helmut and Ursula on arrival in Kosmas
And so it was to be, two nights in Leonidio to be followed by two nights in Kosmas. The reality is, there is no public transport between the two places and so it was that I set off to attempt to make auto stop (hitching a ride) to Kosmas. A very hot day and a heavy pack and I waited and I waited. Not a lot of traffic, however, decided I may have been standing in an unlucky spot and so I moved a little further up the road under the shade of a mulberry tree. Eventually a Greek man conversed with me, he said I wouldn’t get a lift from there and suggested I walk uphill to the town boundary from where he believed it would happen for me.
There I made the acquaintance of an elderly Greek man who spoke very good English, having been a seaman and travelled the world to every place he said except Australia and New Zealand. Presented me with a bunch of roses with amazing fragrance that he had picked in the morning from his garden. He used my mobile to telephone a relative he thought may be driving to Sparti that day but she had already departed. The darling left me by the side of the road as he set off on his daily one hour walk, complete with walking stick, for the good of his health. Naturally, he wished for me to be no longer there on his return and I wasn’t, because along came Helmut and Ursula, a German couple, in their camper van.
They were heading for Monemvasia and merely stopped to study their map. I approached them and when they realised they were not on the route they had intended to take, as luck would have it, they changed their route in order to get me to Kosmas. The road was winding and takes one higher and higher into the mountains where at about the halfway point, you come to the Monastery of Panagias Elonas. Fortunately, Helmut and Ursula were also keen to visit there and so it was that we walked the final kilometre to see this remote and beautiful place.
On reaching the mountain village of Kosmas, we stopped at the Square, it was photograph time, I bid them farewell and sat down at a cafe for a much needed cool orange drink. Since the contact I had for Kosmas Studios had not confirmed anything with me, my next move was to find somewhere to stay. Then, along came Costas No.2.