Day 8 - Kalamata / Stoupa

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Awoke at the crack of 11:00am and stumbled through breakfast. We realized that we were too late to make the 08:30 ferry to the island of Zakinthos, so decided to go for the second choice, a trip to Kalamata for shopping (yippy skippy), then down the coast to the beautiful beach at the town of Stoupa. The last few days, we have chosen our beaches by looking at the racks of postcards at the tourist joints, then going to the beach that has the best postcard. The drive down to Kalamata was much quicker than expected since the roads were much better than anything we have driven on for the past week. Kalamata did not disappoint. We found our way down to the port area and had a frappe while we planned our attack on the shopping district. Mary and Rachel were clearly in charge, I just carried the wallet. We started out at a typical tourist store where Rachel found several things for her friends. I also got a replacement hat with a wide brim and ventilation for my bald head. A huge improvement. We then attacked the real shopping district. We worked our way from shop to shop, and Rachel managed to find a pair of shoes that Mary and I thought were cute but strange, and a new top that looks fantastic on her. We also stopped for a fresh-made Greek meal that was a kind of a chicken sandwich on fresh pita bread. All three of us stuffed ourselves for four Euros. Eventually the shopping wound down as the siesta time closed down all of the shops, and we knew it was time to head to the beach. The road from Kalamata to Stoupa was very narrow and winding like many mountain roads in this part of the world. I was a bit burned out on this high anxiety type of driving, but the scenery more than made up for it. The southern high mountains are very barren, steep, and quite beautiful. Stoupa itself is a tourist town that is very charming and certainly looks like a postcard. It turns out that the beach here was my favorite thus far. There are a lot of offshore rocks, and the snorkeling was first rate. I spent most of my time looking at pretty, shiny fish, while Rachel and Mary took walks to look at pretty, shiny, Greek men. All in all, the few hours we spent in this wonderful place was relaxing and memorable. The drive back was a bit long, but uneventful, basically plodding along with the stream of beach traffic back to our villa. Tonight we are doing laundry (although we think we may have purchased fabric softener rather than detergent), and planning on a full assault on our first Greek island (via a morning ferry) tomorrow. Another fantastic vacation day.

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