Samantha goes to Hamburg

by Sally Branston

"Turn around when possible!" "Make a u-turn!" Samantha's tone of voice seemed to be getting more and more exasperated.

Samantha is named after Humphrey Lyttelton's less voluble assistant on I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue on Radio 4. Humph's Samantha says very little. Possibly because she is imaginary. Our Samantha doesn't really exist either. She's our satellite navigation system and she doesn't like it when we deviate from her chosen route.

Samantha's idea was that we would go from Xanten to Soest via the great urban sprawl that is Duisburg, Essen, Bochum and Dortmund whereas we preferred a more rural A-road, passing through a pleasantly wooded and agricultural landscape. What if it took a little longer? We were on holiday. Samantha was not pleased and refused to shut up. "Turn around when possible," she insisted, through gritted microchips.

Xanten has the distinction of being the only place in Germany to begin with the letter "x". It's a pretty town not far from Kleve (Cleves) with cobbled streets, a working windmill, a towered gateway and a historic church. It was settled by the Romans in about 100 AD and there is an archaeological park just outside the town where you can participate in a Roman-style banquet. The church is dedicated to Saint Viktor whose grave was believed to have been amongst those of early Christian martyrs who met their deaths there in the 4th century and who gave their name to the town Ad Sanctos Martyres - now contracted to Xanten. There are lots of cafés and inns around the square. After lunch of the local Westphalian speciality of broad beans and bacon pieces in a white wine sauce, we set off across the Rhine to Soest.

Samantha came into her own when it came to navigating the winding streets of old Soest, delivering us neatly to a car park at the back door of Im Wilden Mann, a traditional German inn. Negotiating the sloping floor of the bedroom, we discovered that we had a nice view of the town square and set off immediately to explore. Quite by accident, we discovered the starting point of a signposted town trail nearby and two and a half hours later, when we ended up at point number thirty-two, a few metres from where we'd started, we felt we had "done" Soest's green-tinged stone buildings sufficiently well to enjoy dinner in the inn's large restaurant.

Next day was Easter Saturday and what a contrast to the quiet day that had preceded it. Arriving in Osnabrück, we did a nightmare tour of the town looking for somewhere to park. All the shops were open and busy, but eventually we found somewhere and headed for the old town. There were a surprising number of beggars, entertainers and punks in the streets. German punks tend to look a little intimidating on account of being about two metres tall, including their Mohicans, and they seemed like some historic, Nordic army of invasion with their studs and studded-collared dogs. In complete contrast was the rather camp, hand-on-hip statue of Frederick Barbarossa outside the historic town hall. Osnabrück's main claim to fame is that the Peace of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years War in 1648, was declared from the steps of that town hall. The interior has a more contemporary peace dedication and an exhibition showing the town's near total destruction during the Second World War.

We thought we'd give Samantha a treat , so we headed for Hamburg via her preferred motorway route. At 140 kph, or 87 mph, I was one of the slowest on the road. Two-lane German motorways aren't for the faint-hearted. On the rare occasions when I came up behind a slower vehicle, I needed a gap behind me of about half a mile in order to get past without a Mercedes in the boot. I only got flashed twice. At one point where the road became three lanes, a British car in front did the typical British thing and immediately pulled into the centre lane doing exactly 70 mph oblivious to the sudden braking and parting of the ways behind as cars veered to either side to avoid him.

Hamburg is difficult to characterize and not an obvious destination for most British tourists. It's probably worth a stop-off if you're in the area, but not a special trip. Nevertheless, we enjoyed a full thirteen hour day of sightseeing, but you have to seek out its treasures and take advice from a good guide book or, even better, a German friend, in order fully to appreciate it.

We began Easter Sunday morning at the Fish Market. This early morning Sunday market begins at about 6am and is over by 10 and sells everything from live chickens to leather goods. The early finish was the condition extracted by the church when it first gave permission for the market to be held, thus enabling shoppers to go on to Sunday service afterwards. It was interesting to watch the traders filling up baskets of fruit or boxes of house-plants. The eel stall was one of the most entertaining. By 9 o'clock we were in the market hall, drinking hot chocolate and eating doughnuts to the accompaniment of a local rock group. The Germans were mostly drinking beer by then and everybody seemed to be having a good time.

From here, we went to the old tunnel under the Elbe, car-free on a Sunday, and walked under the river to the other side and back again. Both cars and people get down to the tunnel via lifts. Then it was time for Kaffee und Kuchen before taking a boat ride on the Aalster lake and its canals, past the back gardens of some of the wealthy residents of Hamburg. After lunch, we walked through some of the remaining older streets in town. There aren't many: not only because of the War but also because the city was formerly constructed largely of wood, with very narrow streets and therefore prone to burning down from time to time. There is however an interesting warehouse district and an Expressionist office district.

We still wanted to discover more, but whilst the spirit was willing, the flesh was getting weaker, so we jumped on one of the city sight-seeing buses and still managed to see a bit more. Our guide was a well-spoken, informative Portuguese immigrant. There must be quite a few of them because the restaurant area recommended by our hotel desk clerk consisted almost entirely of Portuguese restaurants. As we'd eaten there the previous evening and were trying to conserve resources, I'm afraid to say that we finished the day, courtesy of Burger King, with a hamburger in Hamburg!

Next morning, after a rather good breakfast, we allowed Samantha to have her own way and take us to the motorway. Not for long, however. The traffic was horrendous at the end of the holiday weekend and the motorway that we'd hurtled up two days earlier at 90 mph was reduced to a slow crawl. By early afternoon, we were pleased to get off it and head into Münster for a rest and a wander round.

Münster rivals Osnabrück in its claims to be associated with the Peace of Westphalia and goes one better. Their Town Hall boasts the actual room where the treaty was signed. It's worth a look if you're passing through, as is the astronomical clock in the cathedral. There was an intriguing date plaque fastened to the wall of a house nearby. Just a date a couple of years into the future. Is it the day the owners' mortgage gets paid up? What is its significance? We shall probably never know.

But we enjoyed Easter in northern Germany with Samantha, despite her nagging. I wonder where she'd like to go next?

First published in VISA issue 74 (Aug 2007)

Moscow on a Shoestring

by Maxine Bates

Taking advantage of our Avios (formerly Airmiles) four of us decided to fly with British Airways from Heathrow to Moscow to spend Easter in the Russian capital. [Note that Easyjet now operate this route too.] It was exactly 25 years since my previous visit so I was interested to see how things had changed.

St Basil's Cathedral

We had departed from the East Midlands in snow and arrived in Moscow to heavier snow. However, the difference was the Russians are geared up to bad weather so all the major roads and walkways were snowploughed or shovelled so we had no difficulty reaching our accommodation. We had pre-purchased train tickets via the internet so walked out of the airport terminal straight onto the railway platform and 45 minutes later arrived in the centre of the city. From there we managed to buy a book of metro tickets – it was really handy one of our group studying Russian at night school! – and found our way to Chistyie Prudy metro stop. Then a 15 minute walk to our accommodation for four nights; the fairly new Backpacker Ecohostel. Unbeatable value at approx. £14 per person per night.

We decided to spend our first full day, and also Good Friday, exploring Red Square and the Kremlin and awoke to glorious blue skies. Perfect for picture taking. It was around 20 minutes walk from our hostel to Red Square and the first view of St Basil’s Cathedral was awe-inspiring with the multitude of onion shaped coloured domes. At the opposite end of Red Square from St Basil’s lies the refurbished History Museum with its red facade. Behind it is a brass plaque denoting the exact centre of the city. It appeared that if you stood on it and tossed a coin it brought luck. Although it was unclear why people faced in different directions and tossed the coins in different ways. The famous GUM department store is situated on one side of the square between St Basil’s and the History Museum. This has changed completely since 1988. Gone were the old-fashioned display cabinets with stock behind glass with pay counters and receipt counters and lots of bureaucracy. The large store now resembles Harrods from the outside and a shopping mall complete with familiar names inside. Opposite GUM and in front of the Kremlin walls is Lenin’s mausoleum. During my last visit we were not able to go inside and this time it was being refurbished and due to reopen in May 2013 so once again we were unable to see the embalmed body of the former president on display. (Not sure I would have wanted to anyway! It all sounds a bit gruesome!)

 

We wanted a quick lunch so opted for McDonalds. But not any McDonalds. This was the first Western restaurant to open in the former Soviet Union and diners at that time joined long queues to spend a month’s salary on a burger. Luckily the food is much cheaper nowadays! Nearby we saw mascots promoting the Sochi 2014 winter Olympics.

As we walked around the walls of the Kremlin we found the eternal flame and were just in time to watch the changing of the guards. Rather them than me standing out for hours at a time in the freezing cold! Purchasing tickets to enter the Kremlin was a little confusing with some staff more helpful than others. We opted to wander on our own rather than take a guided tour. Each building had a leaflet that visitors could pick up at the entrance in several languages describing the history and what was inside. Apart from several churches and cathedrals we saw the Tsar cannon (never fired), the 200 ton Tsar bell (never rung as a major fire broke out as the mould was still setting and well-meaning firemen doused it causing a giant crack) and Ivan The Great’s bell tower (unfortunately closed to visitors). Upon leaving we continued walking around the Kremlin walls which led us down to the Moskva river. The water was frozen which explained the lack of boat trips during winter months!

The following day we visited the Cosmonaut Museum. We paid approx. £4 each for admission and declined to take our cameras which would have cost an additional £4 each. Free lockers were available to store coats and bags. The monument to space exploration is outside whilst inside there are galleries displaying everything to do with the Russian space programme from the early days until present day, including Laika the dog (after a visit to the taxidermist!). Although little of the signage was in English it was nonetheless an interesting morning. We then wandered to the park opposite where we found some fairground rides – the giant ferris wheel was £7 so we watched rather than rode as that seemed expensive - and the exhibit of the people’s economic achievement; an ornate building now housing market stalls. The place to go for traditional matryoshka dolls.

Matryoshka dolls

Next stop was the view point on the hill above the city and also home to the wonderful architecture that is Moscow University. However, our journey was not as simple as anticipated as the view point lies between two metro stops and the funicular that had been recommended by hostel staff was not open. We ended up having a tramp through the woods in snow and ice and arrived at the view point at the same time as a snow blizzard. We saw the ski jump built for the 1980 Olympic games and a bride and groom having their photo taken whilst releasing a dove. I assume this is a tradition as I remember seeing the same on my last visit. Beyond that we didn’t linger as we were getting cold and wet, so headed back to our hostel which was so warm we slept with windows open!    

On our third day we visited Gorky Park, even though we’d been advised it wasn’t a good time of year to visit as the winter ice rink was in the process of being removed and the summer attractions hadn’t yet opened. Our mission was to see the Buran space shuttle, although having found it, it was unclear whether this was the original or a replica and there was no signage and nobody to ask.

Then it was off to Ismailovksy outdoor market where there was more opportunity to buy wooden matryoshka dolls (depicting politicians, footballers and other celebrities as well as traditional babushkas), hand painted eggs, ex Soviet military paraphernalia, fox fur hats and more. At the centre was the Vodka Museum. A small admission charge gave access to two rooms detailing the history of the vodka industry in Russia and display cabinets, including a bottle of vodka with 96% alcohol. At the end there was chance to do a little vodka tasting.    

That evening we managed to buy tickets for the famous Moscow Circus and opted for the cheap seats costing around £8. I’d expected us to be right at the back and needing binoculars to see anything when in fact we were only nine rows behind the top priced seats costing around £60. A bargain and entertaining night out. As my guide book stated “a pie in the face is a pie in the face in any language”! Though folk who don’t agree with performing horses, elephants, dogs and parrots would be advised to stay away. We decided to walk back to our hostel so that we could see the Bolshoi Theatre and Red Square by night. Both beautifully lit.

On our final morning we decided to take a tour of the metro system en route to the airport. The metro is one of the top tourist attractions in Moscow due to the never-ending escalators, stained glass, statues, murals and chandeliers. We had selected the seven most ornate stations to visit and plotted a route. The trains were so frequent that we finished our tour much faster than expected so had time for lunch at an underground café. 

We sampled borscht soup several times during our trip and each one tasted totally different. The best was at the Mya Mya (pronounced moo moo) cow themed buffet restaurant. Very pink and creamy and served in a cow print bowl! We tended to eat at local fast food restaurants (think borscht and blinis rather than burgers) or buffet restaurants where we could sample traditional food fairly cheaply. Other restaurants seemed much more expensive so could easily take a big chunk of your holiday budget if not careful. One evening we met up with a young Russian guy who was the son of a friend of my partner’s Russian night school teacher (!) with whom we had been put in touch. Alexander spoke great English, but must have chosen one of the busiest bars in which to meet. Pilsner is one of a chain of bars/restaurants popular with young trendy types. To us it was a shock to be asked if we wanted smoking or no smoking and even though we requested the latter our clothes still had that tobacco smell upon leaving. Another evening we were relaxing at our hostel after a day of much walking and got talking to a Russian lady. Rather than stand chatting in the corridor we invited her into our dorm and listened to her interesting life story whilst sitting at her feet in our pyjamas and sipping wine. Bizarre but amusing. This is the stuff of independent travels!    

Even taking into account the visa fee of approx. £120 each, because of our almost-free flights and cheap accommodation this trip actually cost no more than the one I made 25 years ago.

 

First published in VISA 110 (August 2013)

A Visit to Cornwall

By Rachel Kruft Welton

We arrived at the Cornish Bed & Breakfast late on Thursday evening. It was the Easter weekend and we had come to St Just in Penwith - about as far west as you can get in the West Country. We were staying in the obscurely named Coachhouse Suite, which consisted of a spacious room on the top floor of a converted barn made of the cool grey stone so often used in Cornwall. We could see the sea from the window.
 

St Just is a small town about a mile and a half's walk across fields from the B & B. It has a couple of shops, cafes, pubs, a chippie and some souvenir and craft shops. A narrow road leads down to the coast and to Britain's only Cape - Cape Cornwall. It has a small monument on it that the National Trust unaccountably decided to put there. The breeze was fresh and salty and the walk back up the hill was a little taxing to us computer blimp escapees, as our most tiring job usually is pressing the 'return' key.

Seaweed at Penzance

Discarding walking for the motorised comfort of Ember, the trusty red Fiesta, we drove around the spectacular coastline, past derelict tin mines. There are many prehistoric sites in Cornwall, but one of the most famous is the Men-an-Tol. This consists of a circular stone with a hole in the middle, flanked by two upright stones. Legend has it that crawling through the hole cures everything from infertility to rickets. As we have been waiting for a child for four years already, we have heard many suggestions for fertility charms. We crawled through the Men-an-Tol, giggling like schoolchildren.

 

Close by is the 9 Maidens stone circle, somewhat overgrown with heather and moss. Then back to Ember and round the coast to St Ives. If you ever have the chance to visit St Ives' wonderful steep and narrow streets, do remember not to park at the top of the hill. It's a long way up. We wandered round St Ives, enjoying ice-cream and sea views, streets of pretty whitewashed cottages and a meal at a vegetarian restaurant. We didn't, however, manage to find the pub advertising itself as sporting a "large collection of Toby Jogs". Shame.
 

The coastal road home must have been as delightfully precipitous as it had been on the way to St Ives. However, in the dark, we couldn't see, so we didn't care. We sped back towards the B & B, pausing only briefly to pick up two teenage boys who were hitckhiking. They enlivened our journey by giving us helpful tips and expounding their theory that long bus journeys are considerably shortened if you smoke a good joint beforehand.
 

The following morning started foggy, but cleared later. Our first stop was Modran's well and the ruins of a Benedictine chapel. The area is wet woodland - green trees, smothered in feathery lichen and dripping with moisture. In the mist, the air was still and quiet. The precise location of the well proved impossible to find without wellies and a love of mud. The approximate location, however, was clearly marked by hundreds of differently coloured wishing knots, ribbons, rags, ropes and strings, tied to every available branch, twig and stem, each representing someone's wish. This is a wishing well of the old style.
 

Piper Stone, Lanoma Cove

On to Penzance, a pretty city, friendly and busy, but lacking the magic of our previous stop. We bought postcards, avoiding the ever-present ones of eclipses, and a couple of books and had lunch in the Dandelion Cafe. I took some neat photos of the seaweed-encrusted hawser lines in the harbour and we went on to Mousehole, which has streets as narrow as the name suggests. The highlights here include some scrummy gooseberry ice-cream, finding a foot-long ex-shark and outwitting a barnacle fast enough to dislodge it from the rock.
 

Lanoma Cove, a few miles further on, is famous for its smugglers and wreckers and for being pretty. I think the parking attendant was a direct descendant of the wreckers mostly from his ingenious policy of blocking nearly everyone in, using a van full of scuba divers. We left without parking. A little further along the coast road, we stopped and climbed over a gate to visit the 2 piper stones. These are magnificent - 14 feet tall, they dwarf all else. They are connected with a stone circle in an adjacent field called the Merry Maidens. The circle is fairly large and the stones are about waist high. There were a few merry hippies about, absorbing the atmosphere. I guess they must have been going on a long bus journey later.
 

Last stop on our coastal tour appropriately was Land's End. We objected strenuously to forking out £3 to park and so we parked in the pub car park for nothing and walked. We did have to climb a few dry stone walls and brave a scratching of brambles, but we got to see Land's End and the striking rugged cliff sides around that part of the coastline. We walked back the easy way, along the road, and had a meal in the pub before going back to St Just.
 

Easter Sunday: and not even a huge chocolate egg for breakfast could quite clear my hangover, or the fog. We drove down to the Miracle Theatre, hoping the fog would burn off. It didn't. The Miracle Theatre is an amazing amphitheatre, carved into the steep cliff face, overlooking the sea. They perform plays there outdoors and the stage includes a stone throne, gateways and balconies. It is truly spectacular, even in fog.
 

We decided to try the other coast to shake off the damp mist. We went to Hoyle and visited Paradise Park, a delightful bird sanctuary. I loved the sleepy owls and the fish-feeding frenzy of the Humboldt's penguins. Nick fell in love with the incredibly ugly ibises, with their long beaks and wrinkled faces.

 

We walked down into Hoyle centre, which was totally uninspiring. The highlight there was a little egret wading through the estuary poking for food in the sand. For non-ornithologists, little egrets tend to live in Spain and Morocco, so this chap was a smidgin off course - must have been the fog.

 

On the way back to the B & B, we stopped at a ruined village called Crysanster, dating back to 3AD or so. Despite being overgrown with grass and heather, it was still quite clear where the walls and doorways were. The hearth stone and grinding stones were still there, too. All of it was still covered in drifting, unnecessarily atmospheric mist, but it drew me just the same.
 

Easter Monday: time to go home to Worcestershire. We bribed Ember with a full tank of diesel and left about 10 am. It quickly became clear that so had everyone else. After queueing on the A30, we opted for the scenic route through Devon. It was worth it for the scrumptious scones in the calorific cream tea we had. We stopped at Cheddar Gorge and saw the caves (and about 700 tourists). The caves were great and the tourists were everywhere. With hindsight, leaving Cheddar at 5 pm on Bank Holiday Monday might be seen as a bad idea. Every road heading north towards Bristol was stationary with traffic going nowhere fast (as it were).

 

Eventually, we decided to go to Bath for an evening meal in a great restaurant call the Bath Tub. Enough food and a surfeit of wine and I was all for breaking into the Roman Baths in the town centre for a skinny dip. Fortunately, our plans were foiled because the windows were unaccountably locked and anyway, we would have disturbed the infamous nesting duck that was holding up Bath city council's restoration plans. We hit the M5 north of Gloucester and, by the time, we got home at midnight, I think Ember was as tired as we were.
 

First published in VISA issue 33 (summer 1999).

 

 

 

 

Easter in Latvia

by Maxine Bates

Finding our own way to the hotel from the airport we soon discovered that we could not communicate well with many of the locals. The older people tend to speak Russian whilst the younger ones speak Latvian so, even using our Eastern European phrasebook, we weren’t sure which language we should be attempting. We stayed at the Toss Hotel – booked via the Ryanair website – which is a converted flax mill on the outskirts of the city. It was clean and comfortable, provided an ample breakfast, and even had a small leisure club with lap pool, sauna and steam room.

Art Nouveau District

 The city is easy to explore on foot, but don’t navigate by churches as there is at least one on every street! Your first stop should be the tourist information office in Town Hall Square where helpful staff can provide free walking tour leaflets. We followed two routes and walked miles seeing all the main attractions. The Town Hall itself was originally constructed in the 14th century, destroyed during World War II, and reconstructed in 2003. Nearby Liv Square is named in memory of the Liv tribe who were the original occupants of Riga and now has lovely flowerbeds surrounded by restaurants. On the edge of the square is the bizarre Cat Building where cat sculptures perch on each of the corners of the tower. The next square is home to the Riga Dome, the Latvian Evangelical cathedral, and when the organ was installed in 1884 it was the largest musical instrument in the world with 6,718 pipes.

The Gunpowder Tower once guarded the main entrance to the city and now houses the Latvian War Museum which is free to enter and covers five floors of exhibits. There are English translations. Other museums are dedicated to art and design, photography, pharmacy, occupation and more. Too numerous to visit during a short break when it is pleasant enough just wandering around the cobbled streets and parks. Various styles of architecture can be seen throughout the city from Roman and Gothic to Renaissance and Baroque, but the most prominent style is Art Nouveau, particularly around the Alberta Street district which now houses university departments. At the end of one of the main streets, Raina Boulevard, stands the Monument to Freedom. This tall obelisk is topped with a woman holding three golden stars above her head. The stars symbolise the historical regions of Latvia – Kurzeme, Vidzeme and Latgale – and the monument was funded by the Latvian people in the early 1930s as a symbol of their desire for freedom. Two guards stand at the base.

Be sure to visit the Reval Hotel and take the lift to the top floor for stunning views over the city, including a bird’s eye view of the ornate Orthodox Cathedral of the Birth of Christ with its onion-style domes. There is a viewing window directly out of the lift, although we visited at the right time to treat ourselves to cocktails in the penthouse bar with floor to ceiling windows. For other interesting viewing, visit the Central Market which is housed in several former zeppelin hangars and has stalls selling everything from locally made honey to pig’s trotters! Even higher than the Reval Hotel is the TV Tower on an island in the Daugava River. The tower is 368 metres high and there’s a lift to a viewing platform. We ended up with our own guide who did not speak English, but luckily we both spoke some German so I did a little impromptu translating.

Orthodox Cathedral

 One day we took the train out of Riga to the countryside of Sigulda where we caught a cable car over the river and followed a walking trail to Turaida Castle. En route we saw Gutmanis Cave and stands selling handcrafted walking sticks, and once at the castle wandered around the sculpture garden and climbed the tower for spectacular views. However, we didn’t see any lunch options and had to settle for chocolate and crisps from the only shop in the area. Definitely a gap in the market! Another day we caught the bus to the outskirts of Riga and visited the Latvian Open-Air Ethnographic Museum where traditional buildings from all parts of the country are displayed over several acres and craftsmen hold demonstrations. Being Easter there were also displays of rabbits and eggs! You can spend a whole day here for a very small amount of money.

We found that whilst Latvia on the whole was quite inexpensive, restaurants in the city centre were higher than UK prices. After eating small portions of overpriced bland Italian food on our first night, we then discovered the Lido buffet restaurant near our hotel and ate our evening meals there for the rest of our trip. There are several of this restaurant chain around the city, but the one we dined in is housed in the largest wooden building in Northern Europe. There are three floors with live music downstairs and a small amusement park outside. It’s a little confusing upon entering as there are no greeters. You simply find an empty wooden table, select from the huge buffet counters and pay at the till. There are hundreds of dishes to choose from including traditional cold pink Latvian soup and grey peas, as well as starters, salads, fish, meat, poultry, desserts and more, all at very reasonable prices. The restaurant has its own brewery and the Latvian sparkling wine is ridiculously cheap at 1 lat (approx. £1.20) per glass.

We can all recommend Latvia as an interesting destination.

First published in VISA 88 (Dec 2009)

Easter in Crete (Greece)

By Helen Matthews

Plakias, Easter 1995



Plakias, SW Crete

I didn’t think anything of it the first time it happened. I had just arrived in Plakias, on the southern coast of Crete, and was sitting outside a café, waiting for some much-needed refreshment.

Then it happened again.

There was an explosively loud bang, which seemed to emanate from the jetty. A glance in that direction noted only a group of nonchalant-seeming locals, none of whom appeared to be armed.

Clearly it could not have been a bomb, and even the local hire cards seemed unlikely to backfire quite like that.

It was a day or so, and many sudden explosions, later that I finally realised what was going on. It was a few days before the Greek Orthodox Easter, which is celebrated, at least on Crete, as a cross between a religious festival and the English Guy Fawkes night.

The sound of fireworks grew more frequent, until, on the Saturday evening, the celebrations reached their culmination. Fireworks were even set off in the middle of the road.

I was fortunate enough to be taken to the church service in the nearby village of Mirthios, a couple of miles above Plakias. The church was packed, as was the tiny courtyard outside, where I was standing. Boys who had obviously never heard of the firework code stood on surrounding roofs and let off fireworks with great abandon throughout the service, but I was still not prepared for the finale.

At midnight, the priest came out into the courtyard with a candle, from which villagers (and the occasional tourist) lit candles they had purchased earlier. It was supposed to be good luck to reach home with the candle still alight. Having seen what came next, I think it is probably good luck to get home at all.

As the priest emerged, the church bells started to ring. An interesting technique was used for this – all the clappers had been tied together somehow, so that all four bells could be rung by pulling a single rope.

Meanwhile, back on the rooftops, the fireworks reached a crescendo and an effigy of Judas was burnt. A German tourist next to me performed an interesting dance as he discovered that his hair was smouldering from stray sparks.  The overall effect of smoke, flames, noise and explosions made me half expect to see the BBC war correspondent, Kate Adie.

Suddenly it was all over, and I returned to my hotel, where the proprietor offered us Easter biscuits, coloured hard boiled eggs and Metaxa from his Easter table.

The timing of Greek Easter had not been one of my considerations in planning the trip. I had chosen April as I wanted to see the wild flowers at their best, but this was an experience I would not have liked to miss.

First published in VISA 1995