Papingo Rock Pools
We were sad to leave Albania but it was time to head to Greece.
We were only going to be able to stay in Greece for 2 weeks as that’s all we had left on our Schengen time.
The Schengen zone is a group of 27 countries in Europe. Before Brexit people from the UK could travel freely between those countries. Sadly that all changed poste Brexit. As UK passport holders we are now only allowed to stay a maximum of 90 days out of 180 days in Schengen countries. Here is the link if you want to check out which countries are in Schengen. https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/schengen-visa-countries-list/
The rules have always applied to other non Europeans like Americans and Australians etc.
We had been talking to our German friends Maurice and Dorina who we’d met in Albania at Bar Ledh, they’d been in Greece for about a week. They’d been staying at a lake park up for a few days but they were about to leave and head to Papingo Rock pools in the mountains.
It wasn’t that far from the Greek border so was a perfect place to meet them.
We arrived before them and went for a walk, we didn’t go far as it was getting late. It was also peaceful and a very beautiful place.
It wasn’t long before they arrived. We were making dinner. They had eaten earlier but they came inside for drinks and a catch up.
The next day was going to be a hike day. We planned to set off around midday.
In the morning we woke up around 7am and looked out the window to see horses roaming around. We felt so privileged to see this, so magical at this fabulous location up in the mountains so early in the morning.
As planned we set off around midday with a packed lunch and also swimming kit. I was definitely planning to go in the rock pools somewhere and Maurice, was planning to join me. So great to have someone else who likes getting into cold water!
We had a great day. We followed the rock pools and it wasn’t long before we couldn’t go any further! Maurice, went climbing up above to see if we could get through. This is something Dee and I would not have done on our own, we would have turned back at that point! Instead we were climbing right up into the forest above before eventually going back down to the rock pools.
I found some of our climb quite hard with lots of uphill, my dodgy back wasn’t really helping and the fact that our German friends were 30 years younger than us! But I got there eventually and they were very patient!
Once we were quite high up and found a good spot we did a lunch stop. It was great to have such lovely views . We sat there for a while even after lunch just to enjoy the rest and the views.
We continued on a bit further, more climbing before we decided that we should probably start heading back down.
On the way down Maurice and I found our perfect rock pool to get in complete with a waterfall that was quite fierce
It wasn’t very deep which was a shame but we were able to sit down and get right under the waterfall. It was cold but not too bad! Loved the fact that we did this together. It made a change from it just being me!
Once we got back to the van I cut Dorina’s hair. We did it outside and my ‘new salon’ had a great view .
We made a joint dinner that was mainly cooked by Maurice which was a real treat as it’s me that does the cooking in our van.
In the morning we went our separate ways. We were heading to Lake Pamvotida which was near Ioannina and Maurice and Dorina were heading much further along towards the Turkish border to meet their friends. They actually escorted us to the park up as it was where they had been previously and they were heading that way.
Lake Pamvotida
Lake Pamvotida is also commonly known Lake of Ioninna. The town of Ioninna was round the other side of the lake from our park up.
Our park up was really peaceful, sadly it was not possible to swim in the lake, too much pollution.
The day we got there we decided to just relax for the day. There were cows that walked freely around the lake. They even seemed to know when to go for milking !
The following day we cycled to Ioninna to the local launderette. It was a really lovely bike ride following the lake most of the way.
It took about 40 minutes. Sadly most of the town was closed as it was a Sunday, but the launderette was open and we also managed to get something to eat whilst waiting. Just in a kebab shop, Dee had a kebab and I had a pitta with hummus and pitta
The beach park up near Kalamaria
We could easily have stayed an extra day at the lake but because time wasn’t on our side we decided to move on.
We headed to Thessaloniki which is the second largest city in mainland Greece. We got a park up in Kalamaria which was on the outskirts of Thessaloniki. It was a beach park up and there were bars and restaurants around. That night we went out for a meal to celebrate 24 years since we met.
In the morning we considered cycling back to Thessaloniki but decided not to. We weren’t completely sure about leaving the van for so long, although the park up seemed quite safe. We also felt it was just another city. We later found out from someone else that it is a really nice place! It’s often hard because we can’t go everywhere and also as we have found people do have different opinions about places.
We decided to head to Halkidiki, which is where our next post will start.
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