I’ve had a break from blogging as we took a trip to Spetses in Greece to visit a long standing friend and fine printmaker/artist. It’s a long trip that’s worth it. Flight to Athens and a night at Piraeus, the nearby port, before departure the next morning on the ferry. The joy of dropping in on a couple of other islands on the way including Hydra, where Leonard Cohen found himslef in the 60’s. What was he so bloody miserable about? I was in Manchester where one had the rain to be miserable about, and his bloody records did not help.

I was apparently studying art and design, though this was not always apparent to anyone else,  Ros was there too and already showed talent. I remember being very impressed with her stylish haircut, an odd east London accent, and the fact that she’d been on “Ready Steady Go”, one of the orginal pop programmes that was on ITV in those days, as well has her artistic abilities of course!

Are artists like jackdaws? Can’t resist collectiong bits and bobs, this is the wall outside Ros’s place, you’ll never find it, there’s no postcode, but at least you get to see it. For the real deal go to her website: Ros’s site  It’s well worth a click. 

We were on our way to see her and her hubby, as well as to get in some walking. It was February when we set off and I’d packed nice warm clothes. Some never came out of the suitcase. Or accommodation was in sniffing distance of the bakery and in the old town, recommend staying there, though take a sense of direction with you, only a couple of streets have names. Apparently you find places by knowing the names of who lives there.I was looking forward to seeing a postman with a look of total confusion, but it appears that Ros’s post is just delivered to a bar in town where they know she and hubby pop into regularly.

What we found on Spetses was wondefuly scenery, very friendly people and weather to match their sunny dispositions, we were lucky in some respects that we’d caught a good week. I shall blog some more about the place over the coming week with tales of dogs on bikes ( really ) and some unusual community singing, but for the time being take a look at this little video, the result of a walk to the top of the island. No road noise, there are no cars apart from the odd taxi on Spetses. In the distance the Peloponese mountains of the mainline with a dusting of snow on the peaks and a bird in the background. Anyone know what it is?

You may also hear a bee landing on me at the finale to the video. It too was friendly.