Astypalaia: Mesa-Vathi, Exo-Vathi [Inside and Outside Vathi] (Part 6)

In order to reach Vathi, you shoud past Maltezana. You might rent a motorbike or catch the bus. Ask for information before you go, because only three families, about thirty goats and some other pets live in Mesa-Vathi. No electric power and the only telephone is on the boat that links Mesa and Exo Vathi; here you can find a large cultivable plain going downward the coast. In this side of the island a long and wide deserted, and vaguely bleak landscape, spreads before your eyes.

From time to time a soothing bleat of a sheep breaks the silence. Small white forsaken churches came out from the outline of the rocks and you can see just few houses. The wildness here is still untouched. Mesa-Vathi ends next to the sea and within few minutes of a boat trip you can reach Exo-Vathi.

Thrice a week a boat takes passengers on trip along the island. The electric power supplies the small and calm bay named Limin Vathiou because there is a restaurant, Galini (tranquillity), and a landlord. When the boat brings the excursionists, the restaurant is full up; twenty small tables lay on the veranda, are assaulted by tourists hungry of fresh fish and genuine wine.

Northern of Exo-Vathi there is a grotto, Drakospilia (drake’s grotto). This is the most exposed side to the wind and neither the inhabitants dare facing the waves and drafts because you surely risk to break against the rocks. If you want to visit Drakospilia on foot, get ready to walk fast for nearly three hours and don’t forget to wear suitable shoes.

Half way from Drakospilia to Exo-Vathi you can find a monastery, Panagia Thoma. There is no road. You will walk among stones, crushed rocks, thorny bushes and you will pass along rough enclosed fields, which stand for private property, where goats and – beware - bulls too room in.

Astypalaia: What you should visit: Livadi (Part 5)

It means ‘meadow’ and it is the ‘Lido’ of the island. It is situated on a pleasant site: on the coast , on the plain surrendered by the rises that protect it from the North-East wind.

Livadi is more modern than Chora - that’s why it has more structures and facilities. Nearly every family has a second home they rent to tourists.

They grow crops, fruit and various vegetables because large fields are available in Livadi. The houses are bigger and have more stores. There are two main paths that link the country to the smaller houses on the coast.

The promenade is about 200 meters long and runs through the beach and the row of houses, cafes, restaurant, pubs, drugstores that sell a bit of everything. The beach is under and along the rocks that lead to another smaller, but less crowded beach.

A church built on Byzantine foundations raises on the path. The church courtyard is covered by a now faded light blue mosaic reminding a marine style. The church is still open; on the wall there’s an icon covered by a golden leaf - it is of a recent handwork, but it has its own value.

It is quite astonishing for the visitor the fact that the icon can be easily detached from the wall; as a matter of facts, it is just hung by a nail, totally unlocked.

Astypalaia: What you should visit: Chora (Part 4)

The capital city of Astypalaia is Chora. It is castled on a peak covered by the ruins of the late medieval castle once belonged to the Venetian family, the Quirinis. A Byzantine monastery raises inside the walls of the castle and it is dedicated to Our Lady of Panagia Portaitissa. Two white cupolas spread above the bricks of the ruined fortress. The castle still hosted few inhabitants until the beginning of last century, but by the increasing urbanization some families moved away and left it definitively because of an earthquake that destroyed the north-eastern walls in 1956.

From the Castle Chora spreads downward in a semicircle. The most ancient nucleus is just formed by the ‘castrum’ and the nearby houses named ‘xocastra’ which date back to 1417-1750. The second semicircle of houses was built from 1750 to 1870. The third one developed from 1870 to 1912. The last one was built from 1946 onwards and it links the harbor to the castle. It is named ‘Spina’.

Astypalaia' s arrangement has followed a downward movement for strategic reasons. When the castle wasn’t connected to the sea, it was hard to conquer it on the one hand; on the other the castellans could longer resist to sieges and better control arrivals of eventual suspicious boats.

Chora’s road are tight and curvilinear alternate by flight of steps. They follow a weaving that seems impossible to loose at first sight, but ‘every road leads to the Castrum’. The Houses are square-shaped and have a flat roof. They raise up to the third floor so that thay better exploit the room; they are called ‘monospito’ because each floor has just one room where a whole family used to live in the past. The houses are all white colored and have the typical wood colorful main doors that gives a pleasant contrasting effect to one’s eyes. Every house has got its own vase of plants, colored flowers or good smelling oleander on the stairs which decorate the main entrance.

Downtown Chora there are eight wind mills along the main road called Spina. They were in work in the past and the corn used to be milled there.

Astypalaia: Morphology of the island (Part 3)

Astypalaia is the most western island of the Dodecanese, next to the Cyclades. It’s about 95 square kilometers and it is divided by a rocky isthmus the asphalted road has been made on. From this corner you can dominate both sides. The island has the peculiar shape of a butterfly whose isthmus is just the body.

The ground is mostly rocky and the western side reaches 500 meters height, whereas the eastern side is 300 meters high. The few flats areas are closed to the coast: Livadi, Maltezana, Mesa Vathy, Exo Vathy. Fig, orange, lemon and pomegranate trees, grapevines, growing aubergines, herbs, tomatoes, melons, water melons and so on grow here.

In the west the landscape spreads on reddish rocks, blackberry bush and bushes of aromatic herbs such as thymus, oregano and the soothing ‘flascomilio’ from which you can obtain camomile that cures intestinal disorders, stomachache, nervousness, insomnia; the flascomilio is also used in addition to the charcoal, leaving a delicious aroma on grilled meat.

Colors change in the east side. The rocks become whitish and the blackberry bush dyed of a dark green; the reddish ground is replaced by a golden area. Sheep and goats climb the rocks; they have at their neck the typical bells that ring with different sounds so that each owner may recognize them.

The coast is rugged formed by a rocky continuum interrupted only by the plenty deserted coves covered by little superfine stones. Aristotle declared: ‘Astypalaia foe of snakes’ because it is the only island in the Aegean where there aren’t any. This is due to the double yearly passage of storks, greedy of snake eggs; they travel to Africa in the autumn and come from Asia at the beginning of the spring.

Astypalaia: Some of history (Part 2)

The myth of Astypalaia is quite important. She is Europe’s sister, daughter of Phoenix who is at his turn son of Agenor, the father of the Phoenicians. Agenor’s parents are Neptune and Libya. About three thousand years ago, a desert island in the Aegean had been chosen by the Cares who came from Asia Minor. They called it Pilléa, then Astypalaia. The etymon might be divided into two words: ‘Asty’, that is ‘town’ and ‘paléo’, that is ‘ancient’. As a result, the meaning sounds something like ‘ancient town’ or ‘ancient gate’.

Ovid called it Stampalia in one of his ‘Metamorphosis’. Today it has another version, that is ‘Astropalia’ in New Greek. The island had always been appealed by all its neighborhoods for its strategic and geographic position and as a consequence, its inhabitants focused on keeping their independence.

Many peoples possessed it leaving their mark over the centuries - you can tell it by the indelible signs in the architecture, language, habits. Astypalaia succeeded in escaping the enemy attacks by strategic alliances with the Filo-Dorians, that is the Spartans; then it turned its back to those ones in order to enter into an alliance with its ex enemies, the Athenians, that is the Ionian. These alliances were fickle and sudden, expensive and risky and they didn’t always succeed. As a matter of facts, in the Fifth Century the Peloponnese Wars among Greek populations burst out and Athens was defeated. To Astypalaia it was a big loss, because it had to pay its economic share. However, Astypalaia could release from the heavy Athenian ward.

The gods Athena, Artemis, Zeus, Apollo and Dionysus were praised and its inhabitants built temples to honor them; unfortunately those temples do not exist any longer. At last Astypalaia started autarchy. The establishment was run by two main organs: the Senate and the Parliament, called ‘Vuli’. During the Hellenic Age the harbor was used to trade; the people used to plan Olympic Games and the athletes dedicated victories to the gods.

Then the Romans came. They decided not to subdue the island, provided that Astypalaia paid a huge sum, then they signed a treaty in 149 B.C. and let it have its own political autonomy. Pliny the Elder named it ‘libera’, that is ‘Free’. A so small island couldn’t resist to the continuous pirate attacks, so it had to subdue to the new strength of the Christian Age, Byzantium which compelled it to heavy levy.

In 1206 the Serenissima was engaged in the Fourth Crusade, but before arriving to the Holy Land it suddenly changed way and sacked some islands in the Aegean, among which Astypalaia, named then Stampalia. It became a feud of the Venetian family Quirini who, in order to show their power built the castle which can still be seen in Chora today. The quiet life in Astypalaia came to an end in 1453, a bad year for the European Christendom. Constantinople fell under the Turks and Venice had to abandon some of his most precious pearls.

Nearly five centuries of Turkish domination spoiled the island-,the governors exacted exasperating taxes; Greek was still the spoken language. The French Revolution was followed by the 1821 insurrection and Greece was one of the nations that needed freedom from the foreign bondage, but here is the paradox - Astypalaia, a Greek island didn't take part in the movement and stood apart until the Ottoman Empire came to an end. The Italians came back to the island in 1912 and used it as a military harbor during the World War I; then the Fascist Regime was imposed. The Ottoman Empire collapsed when the national states were being founded and the new Greek State claimed its own share. They obtained the Cyclades.

By the end of Second World War the other states acknowledged the Dodecanese to Greece. The Italians left Astypalaia and the island finally was given back to the ‘land of the gods’.

Astypalaia: a butterfly in the Dodecanese (Part 1)

That’s it: Dimitra’s last stop is just Astypalaia. The ferry-boat got empty on the Cyclades during the night and now few passengers are going to land. The most of them are Athenians looking for shelter in the far Dodecanese, very closed to Turkey, on the islands less trodden by the great international tourism. The sun rose a couple of hours ago and a deep light is hitting the white cupolas dominating the landscape, up there on the castle. The dock is a simple quay made of cement, a small party of well-tanned tourist is peacefully standing on waiting to board: Dimitra is going to take them to Piraeus.

Once you are on the island, you should follow the only road which starts just from the small harbour, leads on the coast of Chora and divides the beach from the typical cafés exhaling an appealing smell of food. In front of the first of these cafés there is the bus stop where you can read the timetable on a little blackboard; obviously the timetable is really ‘flexible’. The Islanders are sitting at the cafés, are sipping their coffee and smoking their cigarettes; they have come down the harbour to have a look at the new faces and to watch the boats. Some of the eldest people still remember few Italian words, last memory of the short Italian fascist occupation.

“Are you looking for a room?” A whistle, a name, few greek words and someone gets smiling closed offering you accommodation at his’. So it is for us. We follow Nichols, a middle aged man decently dressed who suggests us to choose a bus or a cab. We go for a bus because the queue at the taxi station is too long; someone explains us that there are only four cars on the whole island.
The shape of a trembling vehicle is getting closed raising a cloud of dust and making a vague noise of a motor-carriage. A few minutes later the bus comes, at last. There isn’t room enough for everyone and we are compelled to stand on a eight square meters surface. A tourist asks in English where the luggage deposit is and the bus driver, who is also the owner, smiling peacefully points out the room between the gate and his sit. Another tourist gets a bit nervous for the bad service, but others are quietly laughing about the adventurous taste of the trip. I’m becoming aware that the bus stops are ‘flexible’, too; as a matter of facts passengers get off and on whenever they want.

At Nicholas’ nod the bus stops and eight tourists including us get off . We struggle a bit to find and collect our baggage, but we finally manage that. His wife is waiting for him on the threshold near the main gate. Further on the right there is a pergola under which there are three big tables made of wood and some chairs. A few guests are busy making their breakfast. Man and wife are now talking and by their expression we guess that there are no rooms available. Nevertheless, the landlord keeps smiling never getting his eyes off me and invites us to follow him on the first floor.

On the long polished corridor there are the numbered rooms. With ‘nonchalance’, Nicholas opens them all. Then he comes back thoughtfully, enters an empty room and in perfect Italian tells me: “quick, put something on the bed!” I’m tired, I have traveled all the night and my reflexes are vaguely slow. But he snorts, he takes my sweatshirt I have around my hips off and throws it furiously on the bed. His smile comes back immediately. He opens him arms and with much satisfaction cries: “Here it is, now this room is taken!”.

Our vacation has just begun.

A Time for Everything

I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live. That everyone may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all his toil — this is the gift of God. (Ec 3:12-13)