Happy Mother’s Day. I’m not home to celebrate but Carol has multiple daughters around to celebrate with her. Well, my bag arrived at 1:30am this morning so I took a 45 minute cab ride out to the airport to get it and then 45 minutes back. As a result I didn’t get much sleep last night but I was delighted to get the bag so that I can do the tour.
The day started with everyone bringing their bag down to the truck and then having breakfast, and getting their bikes ready for the trip. At about 8:20 we left the hotel in a convoy to a nearby site of some Greek ruins for picture taking. Then back to the hotel briefly and then another convoy to the outskirts of the city. Athens is not a particularly attractive city. The recent economic problems have left many storefronts boarded up with lots of graffiti. Once we got mostly through the city we were on our own and the group broke up into smaller groups going at different paces. I went with the fastest group for a while but then their younger legs left me and I mostly rode by myself.
Once we left the city we had to climb over some mountains. In total we did about 3,400 feet of climbing today and most of it was in this first mountain range. It is interesting that you can tell where the top of each mountain is because the top ridge always seems to have windmills along it. Greece seems to be very focused on alternative energy because not only are there windmills along each ridge but there are huge banks of solar panels all around.
We then flew down the mountain to a long flat stretch. I find that I do not enjoy the downhills in the same way I did when I was young. Then I loved the thrill but now I am a bit more cautious, but, still, downhill is better than uphill. The flat stretch was fairly easy riding since there was a fairly strong crosswind that was coming from slightly behind us so even though it was blowing us sideways it was also giving us a push. About halfway along the flat stretch we found that lunch was set up. It consisted of make your own sandwiches with some fruit. After lunch there was a lot of up and down all the way to the hotel. We went through several small towns along the way and everyone waved and seemed delighted to see us. Once we got out of Athens there was very little traffic so it was a very pleasant ride.
The group is split between two hotels in this small town of Thiva so we will all get together at a restaurant for dinner. Tomorrow we head to Delfi.
