Lyd and Dwayne enjoying the gypsy life: At least it's not snowing!

Since my last post we've just been hanging around. Sunday afternoon it cleared up so we walked to the local store and loaded up with vegetables since we missed the Saturday market in Chania. And since Dwayne fixed the grocery buggy with some super glue, I think it will work, as long as we don't bump it to hard on the stairs coming up to the house! The store here in Tsikalaria has a nice selection of vegetables and the price seems good.

Monday it was rainy and windy so ended up inside for the day. These past few weeks have been a little wet. Mostly in the mornings and then it clears up in the afternoon. When we were having lunch with Vivien and Chris they mentioned how nice the weather was last winter, but then the year before that they had snow in Chania! So we should be happy just to get rain once in awhile. Even though when we were driving up to the Botanical Gardens we could see snow on the tops of the mountains further inland. But I didnt get a picture :( Once we get the car I will be able to get that picture.

I worked on our expenses once Vivien told us what the power cost was for Nov - 62E - $95C (.23/kwh). Which I find kinda high since we seldom use the heater! But we do have to run the dehumidifier every night for about an hour to remove the dampness in the bedroom.
Our Nov expenses: Rent $900C Food/car rental/etc $2142 Power $95 Total $3137C Which is still less then we normally spend in Canada :)

Tuesday started out nice and sunny. So quickly did 2 loads of laundry and then we headed to Souda since we were getting Cabin Fever!!LOL!! We figured we would pick up a few groceries, I needed some flour and yeast to try and make baguettes on a rainy day, and then have pizza for lunch at our favourite place. Great day for a walk. Ended up walking 7kms.

Our favourite pizza place

For dinner I had spiced lamb kababs which I made into patties for easier grilling, and made Dwayne roasted lemon potatoes and our usual greek salad :)

Wednesday I got my chance to make baguettes since it was drizzling out. But after all that time working on the dough, the 2 loaves I made didnt really work out :( Think it was to cold in the house for the yeast to work properly. Oh well it was fun. Also had a hard time trying to get the oven up to 400F- seems the pan of water I had to put into the oven for a crispy crust was screwing up the temp. Well now I will slice up the baguettes and make crackers to enjoy with our olive tapenade :) I also made another pot of vegetable soup and pizza dough. Since the baguettes didnt really work out I decided to make pizza for supper instead of the planned soup and baguettes :)

The pizza dough worked out fine because I was able to put in on top of the oven while the baguettes were baking so it was nice and warm. But I just split the dough in 2 and it should have been into 4 dough rounds because the pizza was pretty thick. And since I just had a drip tray from the grill to use as a pizza pan (no cookie sheets here) I was limited to how far I could stretch the dough out. But it all tasted good in the end. It was a good way to pass a rainy day.

Didnt get airy and light

Left over piece thick crust pizza

my pizza pan

One of 2 thin crust pizzas that I will freeze for later

sliced baguettes real thin and ready to bake

Ahhhh crackers :)

I picked this avocado about 2 weeks ago on our walk and it is finally ripe! Was rock hard - like the ones you buy in Edmonton :) Now guacamole and crackers!!

Today it is windy but no rain, and surprisingly it is nice out - about 14C. So should be going out today since I have to check on my cell service for the remaining time we are here. I think it expires on Dec 7th. If its cheap enough I'll renew because I need the google map and maps.me when we have the rental car. I can use maps.me without data but it is not as accurate. And google maps can only be used with data. Oh well will check it out later today.

I've added a couple of extras on the blog, maps of where we have travelled. They are a little large for the site, but I cant figure out how to make them smaller. Still working on :)

Hope everyone back in Alberta are getting through all the snow of the past few days.

Here are some pics of the plants and flowers that even in the rain and cool weather still keep blooming :)

Neighbours lemon tree

Ours :( I'll have to climb up to get that ripe one!!

This bougainvillea use to hang over the trellis upstairs until it got trimmed back. Because of high winds the tree could be blown up and over and making a real mess on the patio. It looked soooo beautiful before the trim!