On the first Friday of July, we moved from Mytikas to a nearby town Zalongo. We're stading in front of the apartment, waiting for someone to come and gives of the keys. When nobody is coming, we decide to call the phone number mentioned on Booking and in a while, a weird duo is coming. Super talkative Greek cleaning lady and her assistans - Armenian who didn't know a word in English and she was always standing by her side, smiling and not knowing what the hell is going on.
Eirini exchanged her profile picture with me and she told us we can contact her every time we need something. After few minutes they left, we found out that there is a problem with water in the whole apartment. A big problem - the water is not running at all. It looked like some tap was turned off so we were searching all around the apartment ... Unsuccessfully. The next few hours were full of phone calls with the staff of the apartment. It turned out that the water doesn't run in the whole area, because a pipe bursted somewhere and even the plumblers didn't know how to solve the problem. Everyone kept telling us, that everything will be fine in few hours. So we waited. We went for a walk. We ate a snack. We went to the beach ... "It will work in the evening," the cleaning lady, apartment owner, his son and a neighbour promised us. The water obviously didn't run even after we came back from a nearby town where we took a shower on a public beach.
Well .. And the problem continuted the next days as well, altough everyone was promising that it will be solved in few hours or even minutes. 9 o'clock in the morning, Eirini sent me a message that everything will be okay in two hours. After four hours we came back from the beach and found out that everything is still the same. Even the owner of the apartments stopped there to explain the whole problem (in italian) and that everyhing will be fine in un ora. He gave us homemade olive oil, a bottle of greek wine, italian grapa as an excuse and from all the other things he said we only understood that we will be kaputo after drinking that.
In the evening, a neighbour came and she interpreter the owner's idea, that we can stay in another apartment until the problem is solved. "It's a beautiful place. The apartment is very nice, it's near the sea, there are reastaurant all around and it's just about 5 km from here!" Since we were getting a bit anxious by the lack of water, we agreed. Well ... there was water. In the apartment and at the nearby beach. But this whole "nice place" was a ground floor apartment by road, in a street crowded with other apartment houses, and really just few minutes from the beach - but a hotel beach with tens of parasols, crowded with people and with a dog ban sign. So we decided we'll make this place an external shower room and we'll spend the rest of the time at the previous place.
Next day we came back from the beach and a miracle happened - the water pipes were successfully repaired and so we didn't have to come back to Vrachos again. I believe that some people would enjoy that apartment in the city, but it's not really our thing. Villa Riza ina Zalongo is a complex of five apartments in a big garden with olive trees and oleanders and orange trees all around the property. The beach is just about 5 minutes walk from the apartment and we never met more then five about five people there at the same time. In Vrachos we were supposed to sit in front of thehouse in a busy street, watch the road, listen to the annoying sound of air conditioning and smell all the restaurant and hotels around ... That was a horrible change.
Water was the main theme of our vacation, not only during our stay in Riza. For the next couple of days, we moved to Glyki, where tourists come mainly beause of the wonderful Acheron river. According to Greek mythology, Acheron is another name for the Styx river that was supposed dead people to the underworld. We first visited Acheron four years ago and we were charmed by the beautiful clear (and freaking cold) water. This time when we were walking through the "forest" lining the river, we were pretty suprised by what we saw. At some places, the wild stream turned into a small creek and at some parts, there were just dry riverbeds.
Eirini exchanged her profile picture with me and she told us we can contact her every time we need something. After few minutes they left, we found out that there is a problem with water in the whole apartment. A big problem - the water is not running at all. It looked like some tap was turned off so we were searching all around the apartment ... Unsuccessfully. The next few hours were full of phone calls with the staff of the apartment. It turned out that the water doesn't run in the whole area, because a pipe bursted somewhere and even the plumblers didn't know how to solve the problem. Everyone kept telling us, that everything will be fine in few hours. So we waited. We went for a walk. We ate a snack. We went to the beach ... "It will work in the evening," the cleaning lady, apartment owner, his son and a neighbour promised us. The water obviously didn't run even after we came back from a nearby town where we took a shower on a public beach.
Well .. And the problem continuted the next days as well, altough everyone was promising that it will be solved in few hours or even minutes. 9 o'clock in the morning, Eirini sent me a message that everything will be okay in two hours. After four hours we came back from the beach and found out that everything is still the same. Even the owner of the apartments stopped there to explain the whole problem (in italian) and that everyhing will be fine in un ora. He gave us homemade olive oil, a bottle of greek wine, italian grapa as an excuse and from all the other things he said we only understood that we will be kaputo after drinking that.
In the evening, a neighbour came and she interpreter the owner's idea, that we can stay in another apartment until the problem is solved. "It's a beautiful place. The apartment is very nice, it's near the sea, there are reastaurant all around and it's just about 5 km from here!" Since we were getting a bit anxious by the lack of water, we agreed. Well ... there was water. In the apartment and at the nearby beach. But this whole "nice place" was a ground floor apartment by road, in a street crowded with other apartment houses, and really just few minutes from the beach - but a hotel beach with tens of parasols, crowded with people and with a dog ban sign. So we decided we'll make this place an external shower room and we'll spend the rest of the time at the previous place.
Next day we came back from the beach and a miracle happened - the water pipes were successfully repaired and so we didn't have to come back to Vrachos again. I believe that some people would enjoy that apartment in the city, but it's not really our thing. Villa Riza ina Zalongo is a complex of five apartments in a big garden with olive trees and oleanders and orange trees all around the property. The beach is just about 5 minutes walk from the apartment and we never met more then five about five people there at the same time. In Vrachos we were supposed to sit in front of thehouse in a busy street, watch the road, listen to the annoying sound of air conditioning and smell all the restaurant and hotels around ... That was a horrible change.
Water was the main theme of our vacation, not only during our stay in Riza. For the next couple of days, we moved to Glyki, where tourists come mainly beause of the wonderful Acheron river. According to Greek mythology, Acheron is another name for the Styx river that was supposed dead people to the underworld. We first visited Acheron four years ago and we were charmed by the beautiful clear (and freaking cold) water. This time when we were walking through the "forest" lining the river, we were pretty suprised by what we saw. At some places, the wild stream turned into a small creek and at some parts, there were just dry riverbeds.
I've never thought about water like this. I always thought, it's difficult for the people who live in the poor countries with lack of water and who can't get proper hygiene ... But I've never been able to step in their shoes. I think none of us can truly imagine how hard it must be. I was getting anxious when I wasn't able to wash the salty water from my hair and flush the toiler for one single day. Even though the owners were supplying us with packed water from a store and we were able to take a shower on the beach. How horrible it is, when some people don't even have water to drink? It's scary how much do we waste with water without even thinking about it. We take it for granted. We believe that we will have enough of it forever. But there's more and more people in the world and less and less water.
I saw that not only at Acheron, but also when visiting other Greek and Macedonian rivers and lakes. Some of them turned into shallow puddles and rivers of thin strands ...
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