Fun at a small Christmas craft sale

On Friday Vivien emailed me saying that the weather looked good for Saturday so if we wanted to join them at the craft sale we were welcome.  She had told us about this last weekend at the Botanical Gardens. She said that we could walk around the village of Vamos, where the sale would be held, while they were selling at the fair. Sounded like a good idea to us.

Saturday morning when we got up the sun was shining and skies were blue! Hard to believe after the last week! So we are happy to go sightseeing.

Vamos is a small village about 45 mins from Chania and we again get to see the snow covered Lefka Ori (White Mtns). There is a large British expat community in Vamos and they are putting on the craft sale.  Both Vivien and Chris are originally from England and have each written and published a book that they are selling.  Vivien's book is about her life with a ragdoll cat for 23 years which started back in Thailand and Chris's is a murder mystery. Also at the fair were people selling jewelry, cider, baking, samosas, chilli, handmade cards, handmade soaps etc.  Interesting little fair.

Lefka Ori mountains

View of the mountains from Vamos

We enjoyed our walk around the old village of Vamos.  Stopped and had a coffee and people watched for awhile, plus read the first chapter of Vivien's book before heading back to the sale. Once we got there we met the couple from Ireland that are renting the penthouse that Vivien and Chris also own and rent out. It is right next door to their own condo. Frank and Lena have been on Crete since April. They are here until next April. They just had their first baby a month ago! They are a young couple - Frank is able to do his work online while they have been travelling. Even though now with a new crying baby things have changed a bit LOL!  We are all going to go to a village near the sea, Gavalochori, to have lunch, but first we have to stop at a store that sells only British/English food and dry goods.  Vivien is looking for Heinz tomato soup! I gave her a hard time about buying tomatoe soup when there are soooo many tomatoes here on Crete!  I found some pancake syrup, mango chutney and a small piece of white cheddar cheese with peppercorns to buy.

Old Village of Vamos

The locals like painting rocks and using for decorations

Very old direction signs (Xania is another spelling of Chania)

Vivien's book- the cover is from a painting a friend did for Vivien

We drive down from Vamos towards the sea on a twisty road, I ask Vivien how old she was when she was visiting monks in Thailand in 1981 - and she said 30 (this was how her book starts out).  And here I thought she was closer to mid seventies not just 2-3 yrs older then me! I say that because when we were at the Botanical gardens some parts of the path were steep and she had to hold onto MY arm to get down, plus on our way to Vamos she had said "and you kids can walk around Vamos while we are at the sale" LOL!!  She has flaming red hair which covers her white hair, so its hard to figure out her age.

We all arrive at the little village and find a nice restaurant with outside seating in the sun. I have lamb which is cooked in a nice wine sauce, Dwayne has meatballs, Vivien has pumpkin pie - now this is a hot pie - not at all like the pumpkin pie I'm thinking of!  It tasted really good - pumpkin cooked with nice spices layered between pastry. The others had the same choices and Vivien orders a litre of wine. As it turns out is is mostly her and I that drink it because Chris won't because he's driving, Lena is nursing so only has a little, same with Frank because he's driving and Dwayne only has a bit. So that left quite a bit for Vivien and I :)  For dessert we were given a nice moist coconut cake and of course raki.  Frank and I had a shot of raki but no one else.

Almost forget again to get a picture of everyone before lunch was finished!

So after about an hour and a half of enjoying lunch and conversation we headed home.  Again we were suppose to go to Vivien's place but ran out of time.  Guess once we have our rental car we can go visit them and Lena and Frank.

Sunday was a quiet day spent at home since it was again raining off and on.

Today it started out nice and sunny but quite windy.  Decided we would walk to a butcher shop about 4 km away towards Chania.  We had previously stopped there and the meat looked good but didn't buy any because we were on our way into Chania.  When we got there there didn't seem to be a lot of variety - but did buy some pork chops, chicken breast and kababs (mixture of ground beef, pork and lamb on wooden skewers)  From there we decided to go have some coffee and snacks.  Then it was off  to another grocery store that is on the bus route so we could catch the 2:00 to Tsikalaria back home.  By now we had walked 6km so ready for a bus to take us back! We needed a few things from a big grocery store so this worked out.

Once we were finished shopping we had about 20-30 mins to wait for the bus. As we are waiting it starts to rain, so we go back to the store and wait under an awning as it really started coming down! We figured we would have to stay here until we saw the bus then "run" across the parking lot to wave it down.  But as it turned out the rain subsided just before the bus came so we were able to wait at the curb and no running required! LOL!!  And once we got off the bus to walk the short distance to our house it was only sprinkling so got home without being soaked - since of course the umbrella was sitting in the house!  It was so clear this morning, but with the winds it didnt take long for the rain clouds to blow in.

And that just about ends another day for us :)

Walking towards Chania and the bitter oranges are starting to fall off the trees - but Dwayne doesn't want marmalade :( 

Love the different red plants for sale at the greenhouse :)