Fruit of the Spoon on Karpathos

Sometimes the best things happen when you least expect them. We were heading south from Rhodes and planned to do an overnight stop on the narrow island of Karpathos, which is about half way to Crete. But Mother Nature had other plans. A big storm was coming in. The weather sites predicted 30-knot winds and waves over 9 feet. The storm made it a good day to stay in port. Even the fishermen in the village pulled their small fishing boats out of the water to a safer place on land for this storm. That is a pretty good sign that something big is going to happen.

The first night we were in the main harbor of Panaghia. But it was not a very protected harbor and the waves were pounding at our boat all night. So we asked around and managed to move to a much smaller harbor built for the local fishermen that was better protected. We navigated through a nest of buoys and squeezed in between the colorful boats. It looked like we were the mother ship amongst the smaller boats. But it made all the difference in the world. Much better protected.

What was going to be a one nights stay stretched into a 4-night stay. And it couldn’t have been more delightful. This somewhat sleepy little fishing village had some of the friendliest people we have ever spent time with. They don’t get many Americans so we were the town celebrities. By the time we left, we couldn’t walk through town without a dozen people wishing us a “kaliméra” nice day.

One evening we went to a local taverna for a traditional Greek meal. The food was amazingly good and the waitress became more than our order taker. We were the only ones in the restaurant so she ended up sitting down and asking a hundred questions about our lives. After the meal, she gave us all a dessert called “fruit of the spoon”. It was candied figs and pickles on top of a dish of traditional Greek yogurt. I have to say, even with the candied pickle, it was quite delightful.

The next day we rented a car and drove around to some of the most beautiful beaches in the Mediterranean. With the inclement weather, we just looked, but it would be a beautiful place with warmer days. Along the roadside, we spotted a very old church. We stopped and were rewarded with incredible Byzantine icons painted on the walls. The church was built in front of a cave that went further back into the mountain. We explored deep inside the mountain using that wonderful technology, cell phones, to light the way.

The center of the island is quite rugged with steep mountain roads and remote villages. The northern half of the island is still pretty inaccessible and we are told the people still wear the traditional Greek clothing. It sounded fascinating, but the trip takes a sturdy Jeep to make it through the rough pot holed dirt road.