MAY BLOG POSTINGS

Day 38 – Karditsa to Trikala: 13.8 miles (27,613 steps)

May 31, 2011 Distance: 13.8 miles (Total: 413.1 miles) Steps 27,613 (Total: 765,903) “Every oak tree started out as a couple of nuts who decided to stand their ground.” Author Unknown Before leaving Karditsa, I spent some time in a... posted 11:56 am 

Day 36 – Rest day and some thoughts on Football

May 29, 2011 “I would love it if we could beat them. Love it. He’s (Alex Ferguson) gone down in my estimation. Manchester United haven’t won this yet, I’d love it if we beat them” – Kevin Keegan, Manager of... posted 11:48 am 

Day 35 – Asimochori to Karditsa: 19.2 miles (37,804 steps)

May 28, 2011 Distance: 19.2 miles (Total: 399.3 miles) Steps 37,804 (Total: 748,290) “The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor... posted June 3, 2011 8:21 pm 

Day 34 – Domokos to Asimochori: 16.4 miles (32,078 steps)

May 27, 2011 Distance: 16.4 miles (Total: 379.1 miles) Steps 32,078 (Total: 710,486) “You live a new life for every new language you speak.  If you know only one language, you live only once.”  - Czech proverb I wake up and... posted 8:09 pm

Day 33 – Happy Birthday – Lamia to Domokos: 20 miles (38,122 steps)

May 26, 2011 “Except ye become as little children, except you can wake on your fiftieth birthday with the same forward-looking excitement and interest in life that you enjoyed when you were five, “ye cannot enter the kingdom of God.”.. posted May 30, 2011 9:05 pm 

Day 32 – Lamia: Rest Day

May 25, 2011 Distance: 0  (Total: 342.7 miles) Steps 0 (Total: 640,286) ‘The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.” Stephen Covey Lamia is a strategically significant city, overseeing a vital coastal plain that is the... posted 4:14 pm

Day 31 – Lamia: 7.2 miles (13,894 steps)

May 24, 2011 Distance: 7.2 miles (Total: 342.7 miles) Steps 13,894 (Total: 640,286) “There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, “Thy will be done,” and those to whom God says, “All right, then, have it your... posted 4:01 pm 

Day 30 – Arachova to Gravia (Parnassos): 15.5 miles (33.170 steps)

May 23, 2011 ‘A bird does not sing because it has an answer. It sings because it has a song.’ Chinese Proverb One of the facts I had not appreciated before arriving in Greece, is that it has an abundance... posted 3:51 pm 

Day 28 – Arachova to Delphi: 7.64 miles (14,477 steps)

May 21, 2011 “Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look there”. — Marcus Aurelius It may sound odd, but you arrive in Delphi unexpectedly. The road down... posted 10:57 am

Day 26 – Livadia to Arachova: 25.3 miles (48,601 steps)

18 May, 2011 “We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that... posted May 26, 2011 3:56 pm 

Day 25 – Aliartos to Livadia: 15 miles (27,900 steps)

17 May, 2011 The Chinese refer to Westerners as people with ‘God’s on their wrists’, always watching the clock and people who can always tell the time, but never have the time. I left on the 6AM bus for the... posted 3:48 pm 

Day 24 – Thiva to Aliartos: 14.3 miles (27,400 steps)

16 May, 2011 “The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page.” – St. Augustine I left Thiva, the ancient city of Thebes, and walked out of the town past the museum, which was... posted 3:42 pm

Day 23 – Vilia to Thiva: 17.2 miles (32,180 steps)

Arriving into Thiva, the ancient city of Thebes, I was struck by the bustling activity around the town square—there seemed to be a natural division as to which side of the square you sat on.  On one side there were... posted May 20, 2011 12:48 pm 

May 15, Reflections on the olive tree

As I leave Vilia in the early morning, I am captivated by the early morning sunlight catching the leaves of a grove of Olive trees. What is it about an Olive tree that seems to resonate with the soul? Thomas... posted 12:38 pm 

Day 22 – Elefsina to Vilia: 21.2 miles (41,658 steps)

This was the first serious test of my shin injury. There was a long climb out of the port of Elefsina into the mountains in the direction of Thiva. I had started at 6:30AM, but the weather was too hot... posted May 19, 2011 9:02 p

Day 21 – Athens to Elefsina: 11.3 miles (20,905 steps)

I left Athens in far better shape than I had arrived. It felt as if the pre-tibial bruise was healing and the remaining discomfort was certainly manageable. I had jettisoned five kilogram’s of luggage from my rucksack, including all my... posted 8:47 pm 

Day 19 – Meeting with the Prime Minister of Greece

“Destiny is something not be to desired and not to be avoided, a mystery not contrary to reason, for it implies that the world, and the course of human history, have meaning. “ Dag Hammarskjold  (Secretary General of the United... posted 8:45 pm 

Day 19 – Hellenic Olympic Committee & The Panatenaic Stadium

“Respect, excellence, friendship, courage, determination, inspiration, equality.” The Olympic & Paralympic Values Day 19 and another rest day brings a wonderful opportunity to realise what the Olympics are truly about. I am invited by Spyros Capralos, president of the Hellenic... posted May 18, 2011 2:31 pm

Athens: the Cradle of Civilisation

“Had Greek civilization never existed we would never have become fully conscious, which is to say that we would never have become, for better or worse, fully human.” W H Auden Mythology has it that when the founding fathers were... posted 2:20 pm 

Day 14 – Elefsina to Athens: 11.25 miles (24,187 steps)

“When the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.” Edith Hamilton (1867-1963 recognised as the greatest female classicist) Sitting at breakfast, suddenly the American National Anthem... posted 8:44 am 

Prime Minster Papandreou receives Lord Michael Bates

An excerpt from Athens News, which is Greece’s oldest English-language newspaper and offers news on politics, business, sport, travel, arts & features and keeps an eye on community issues and hot topics for English speaking people living in Greece. “Prime Minister... posted May 12, 2011 9:58 pm

Day 13 – Elefsina: Rest day, and coping with shin splints

4th May, 2011 One of the consequences of my exertions the previous day was to wake up with a sharp acute pain in the shin of my left leg. I can hardly walk to the shower. I take some ibruprofen... posted 9:55 pm 

Day 12 – Agii Theodori to Elefsina: 26.5 miles (52,549 steps)

2 May, 2011 Set out at 6:30AM to make a good start on the walk during the cool hours. I knew that the distance to my next stop Elefsina was at least 25 miles which would mean 9 hours of... posted 9:46 pm

Day 11 – Corinth to Agii Theodoroi: 12.1 miles (22,469 steps)

2nd May, 2011 “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade... posted May 6, 2011 2:54 pm

Day 10 – Corinth: Rest day, and some musings on love

I find myself still recovering from the events of Day 8 and spend most of the day in and around the hotel dealing with email and writing. I wanted to visit Ancient Corinth up on a hill overlooking the moder... posted 2:49 pm