For 100 kilometers I dragged 100lbs of gear on nothing but a tomato, coffee and a grilled ham and cheese sandwich. 25 km from Olympia my head started to bounce with visions of Anna’s Tacqueria. I could have eaten 4 chicken and rice quesadillas at that moment. When I asked myself if Anna’s might have expanded to Olympia yet – I knew it was time to stop for a minute.
Somewhere in my gear was my savior. A special friend sent me a gift two Cliff bars. I ate the first after my long ride to Perachora, when I was in Vrachati. I almost ate the second, but decided to save it for the right time. Considering if a small chain of tacquerias in the Boston area had expanded all the way to Ancient Olympia seemed the right moment!
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I was thankful to leave Patra. It is a quite dull city. And, it is the rudest city I have ever been to. (Mind you I’m from Boston). With 80 miles on the road ahead, I made my way early to St. Andrew’s Square and the Starbucks. I never drink Starbucks at home but it is the only place in Greece where you can buy 500mL of coffee all at once.
I took the small old road along the south coast of the Gulf of Patra. Unfortunately, as soon as I left Patra, the road was closed for construction. I wound through the roads of Achaia looking for detours to Pyrgos. Eventually, it did carry me back to the roads to the old road.
I found a small cafe/mini-mart in a village along the way with old men sitting about. I grabbed a Nes from the café and two tomatoes from the market. I sat at the table in the café eating one of the tomatoes.
An older guy who was waiting at the bus stop began complaining that the Patra bus wasn’t coming. While I do not speak Greek, it was obvious one of the coffee guys was telling him to ride my Patra. We all shared a laugh.
One guy was surprised. “Menes ellinki? (do you speak Greek?)
“Ohi (no)” I said “but you told him (pointing to the guy at the bus stop) to ride my cycle (using my hands to show the pedal motion) to Patra (pointing back to the city).”
Everyone laughed “Nai (yes), nai (yes)”
After what I can only assume (or hope) were well wishes from the café sitters, I set back onto the old road. In Kato Achaia, I ran into more problems. It is one of these Greek towns that while it has not lost its village flavor, has lost its village size. So the roads are too small for the number of people who now live there. And the signs to Pyrgos were just gone.
I got directions, that despite not being in a language I could understand were quite explicit. He through in some Italian that I could sort of figure out. (Since I have started to tan nobody thinks I’m German anymore, they think I’m Italian). But he also gave me fantastic gestures and visual queues including the break lights of a nearby car for traffic light etc. So I was comfortable heading towards Pygos/Olympia.
I took the new road through Achaia according to the guy’s directions. It was not as scenic as the old road and did not go through all the little villages. But, it was less steep and there was a huge breakdown lane that made me quite comfortable riding along it.
The next place I stopped was Lechiano. I got a grilled ham and cheese sandwich (“toast”) in a small café on the square. They had speakers hung about on the trees. They played bad 70s and 80s American rock. “I Want to Know What Love Is” came on. But without the whole gang or a Swiss guy with a mullet doing tequila shots, I chose not to sing the chorus.
After Lechiano, it was more distance on the new road. The first 100 km of the trip was not terribly difficult – just long. But, with 25 km to go, I was starved and popped my first tube of the trip! Two Albanians watched me pretty intently as I changed the tube. (They thought I was Italian as well!) As I left they told me I should get a car next time.
The last 25 km of the Olympia trip were by far the worst. I was tired, hungry, smelly. And that’s when the hills hit. I had to drag myself over three huge hills (they weren’t that big – but after 100km of cycling lots of things are big).
It took me nearly two hours from Pyrgos to Olympia. But I kept the Olympic fanfare in my head; that kept me going when all else failed! I found my hotel, showered and got some Mousaka! (It was very good and it WAS mousaka.)
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