Greece 10 - The Corinth Canal/the submersible bridge/why are everyone standing there looking down?

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It's our last day in Athens. Getting up early we went down for breakfast. Another good breakfast. Would we recommend this hotel ? Yes we would . Value for money indeed and the best we have had in any city. We were sorry to leave it and the bath which we have languished in for the last two nights. Showers are fine but a bath is sheer heaven.



We found our way back to Monastraki easily. It is odd how it only takes a few days to orientate yourself in any city. On the way we passed the new cathedral the Mitropoli . A vast modern affair sadly closed so no photo opportunities however we did see the small Byzantine church dwarfed in its wake. Again sadly closed .



Buying tickets to return to Kyfissia was easy. 60 cents again for a 90 minute ride . The platform easy to find and the train times up on the boards. We heard it coming before it arrived as the noise reverberates when it goes underground. It was packed with not a seat to be had. The Greek young seem less inclined to give up their seats for the old , infirm or pregnant and sit there with their phones attached to their ears as if glued on. It was not a pleasant ride standing all the way. However we did it and came out at the station in search of a taxi. Where are we going to? Camping Dinososis – but where is it ? We had forgotten the card with the details . It is next to Club Heaven. Glenn searched the internet and got the full address which I showed to the first taxi driver . He looked vague . Camping Dinososis – more vagueness , Showed him the address – he ignored me. Tried the next one with much the same response. We had read that the taxi drivers can refuse you if they cant be bothered to take you where you want to go. You just have to keep going until you find one interested in the fare. I tried again and explained the junction on the Athens road . Still no response. The 560 bus turned up. OK no taxi let’s try the bus . Yet again we had the problem – no ticket . I asked where to get one and the driver showed me. I asked if he would wait for me to get it and he refused saying get on with out a ticket . Well you can’t argue with that can you? We had little idea how to get back as we had not timed the bus in . The only clue was going over the Athens road and then the bus would turn left. Our stop was just after that . Spotting the road I went to the driver to tell him where we wanted to get off . An interesting but rather fraught journey back. As we walked to the campsite we thought – will Suzy be there? What if she is not? How will we get home? What if her wheels have been taken off? Our imaginations were running wild in the short distance from the bus stop to the campsite gates . As we rounded the corner we saw a new addition to the site. Another couple in a van had turned up. They were standing talking much as we did when we arrived . They looked worried much as we had when we left Suzy. There she was though. Still in the same spot, still with her wheels on and she looked the same as ever . What relief . We guessed our new neighbours were worrying what to do if they left their van. I searched out the owner to pay him 22 euros for looking after our girl. No bill, no receipt – obviously a tax fiddle. Something we start to see more and more as we move south of Athens.



Our destination – somewhere nerds find themselves. Suzy the motorhome is parked up on a fairly rough dusty piece of ground in what seems like the middle of nowhere. She is surrounded by tat shops selling all manner of junk, buses full of tourists who must be nerdy like us and a constant stream of people walking back and to from the cafes to a bridge. It is not just any old bridge though. The tourists are looking over and down and there is a constant clicking of cameras. So where in the world is Suzy . Not a few hundred yards from one of the most famous canals in the world. It ranks in the same sentence as the Panama Canal , The Grand Canal and the Suez canal . Suzy is parked up at Corinth and we are within spitting distance of the Corinth Canal.



The Romans made the first attempt at cutting a passageway through the isthmus. Previously the only way to get from one side to the other was to sail through dangerous and choppy waters or use a system of wooden trollies to pull boats through. The emperor Nero using a silver shovel and a whole shipload of Jewish slaves started to dig the first sods of a canal. He failed and the attempt was put on hold until the 1890’s when the gap of 6 km was breached using new techniques and manpower. Opened in 1893 it established Piraeas as a great port.



Today sadly it is too narrow for the supertankers that can hurry and rush the long way round. It has become redundant in a little over 100 years and is just another tourist attraction for nerds like us. The only traffic on it are the cruise boats that take sightseeing passengers for a a couple of hours trip up and down the canal.



The drop from the bridge we were standing on is vertiginous. The sides steep and the gap appears narrow. As we stood looking down we felt nothing but awe for the navigators who made this feat of engineering possible. The drop from the bridge is actually 80 metres and it felt a long way down. As we stood watching a tiny – tiny to us up on the bridge – boat sailed beneath us .



Our next stop was going to be slightly further up the canal. We were heading for another dusty car park where we parked alongside a couple of buses and a few cars. One tired old café on the roadside was closed and on the other a café was doing a roaring trade with the locals . Apart from that the place was peaceful. The roadside red with poppies and yellow with Corn Marigolds. Why had we come here? There is a bridge . Another one but this one is at road level. It does something very special. When it is in the road position cars travel over it whilst crossing the canal. When a boat comes the barriers go down stopping the road traffic , a light changes on the bridge from green to red and the bridge slowly lowers in to the water until we lose sight of it. It grumbles and groans all the way down. The boat passes over it and into the canal and the bridge rises. I doubt many folks come to this point to see this wonderful bit of kit that still works to perfection.



Both of us are enjoying this holiday so much we don't want to it to end. The sun and the simple pleasures of this land are enchanting us.

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