Sailing Aglaya

Ancient Plevrona, also called Pleuron, was located on a hill a little northwest of Messolonghi, in the area of Aetolioarkania, a region that had great importance in ancient times. The name comes from Pleuron, the son of Aitolos, who gave his name to the region. In the Iliad it is mentioned that the city provided 40 ships for the Trojan War. (7th/8th century B.C., Mycenaean period). Plevrona also had a port down by the lagoon with its own fortifications.

The region of Aetolia-Arcania is not known to many, although it has a lot of important ancient sites, including the city of Oiniades with a huge city wall, an incredibly well preserved ancient shipyard and a beautiful theater.

Initiatives have been formed to promote these (and more recent) cultural treasures and local features to a wider audience and to promote them in an ecologically-sustainable way, for example "Messolonghi by locals" (www.messolonghibylocals.com) . They also provide guides who show the ancient sites with great competence, knowledge and broad horizons and organize tours.

Ancient Plevrona was destroyed and rebuilt on a hill north of it on a much larger scale in the third century BC, 10,000 people lived here - Mycenae, so famous today, was not much larger.

The city wall made of huge ashlar-shaped stones is 2km long and has 11 gates and 36 square towers. The city plan with theater, temples, agora, baths and stadium/gymnasion corresponds to the classical Greek system. Especially well preserved is the huge water supply system: There was no water inside the walls, it was piped in from a spring outside, distributed there into various pipes and kept ready in a huge reservoir (33x22m) built directly into the rock.

What you can also see and experience in an impressive way: the excavation and uncovering of the ancient walls and objects is a real Sisyphean task that lasts for years; archaeologists are at work to make more and more ancient treasures accessible to the visitors. And this is true for numerous ancient sites in Greece.  

Apart from the archaeologists at Plevrona, the only other creature we encountered on the huge site was a turtle.

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First the journey to the boat, delayed by almost three month because of Corona, then after a month the return trip to Heidelberg, so that Walter's heart could receive the necessary treatment, and now after the two-month intermezzo at home back on board. First again waiting for the longed for mechanic for our engine cooling. Now he was there and opened the cooling system. Corrosion! And not too scarce. And the turbo doesn't work anymore. Now he unscrewed all affected parts and took them to Patras. Yesterday we learned that not all parts can be repaired. So we also need new parts. But where to get them? Our Nanni Turbo Diesel is not often found in Greece and there is no representation or outfitter for Nanni. The parts have to be ordered - wherever. And that can take up to a month, the mechanic tells us. Apart from the strain on our wallets, we now have to finally give up our plan to be in Poros towards the end of September to take Michelle and Florin on board. We can only offer them a "houseboat" for the planned period. ?

Fortunately, we are here in Messolonghi in a nice, pleasant place. Here we know some people. In the meantime we are also mobile with our bicycles. And we always have beautiful views from our boat (in the photo, for example, the sunrise). 

So for us it means: wait, take care of the boat, take care of ourselves and stay confident, that we will still get to sail this year.

Mikis Theodorakis and his songs were with us for quite a bit of our student years, so we received the news of his death with great sadness. He died at 96 and is buried near Chania, Crete.

Mikis was not only a composer, he was a fighter for freedom and social justice, already in the resistance against the Nazis. Later, in the 1960s to the mid-seventies, there were still military dictatorships in Europe with conditions like today in Belarus, who remembers? In Greece Papadopoulos, in Portugal Salazar, in Spain Franco. Mikis Theodorakis actively fought the military dictatorship in his country, politically - and with songs, for which he went to prison and was tortured, under the Nazis and also later in the sixties. His songs were very popular in the political West Germany of the student movement and also later, we all heard them in the seventies.

He became world famous as early as 1964 with the film music for "Zorba the Greek", in Germany it had the title "Alexis Sorbas", to which Anthony Quinn and Alan Bates danced in the film - Sirtaki. The female lead role: Irene Papas. The film impressively embodies the Greek attitude to life. But Mikis also wrote the music for political films directed against military dictatorships, "Z" and "Phaedra".

He wrote over 2000 pieces, even some of them operas, that are still performed today.

He and his music were part of our political culture at the time, and we are still grateful to him for that. 

Now we are also mobile on land. That fits well, because we are still waiting for the mechanic from Patras to repair our the cooling of our engine.? Two folding bikes are now part of our equipment, which is always on board. 

In Messolonghi at Houtas Bike we ordered them, after three days they were there, cost much less than in Germany. They are not e-bikes.? The service in this bike store is great, we could observe when our bikes were bolted together. So if someone ever comes to Messolonghi and needs a bike .... 

Now we are quickly in town for shopping and can make trips. This is especially good in this waiting time and lifts the mood. In the meantime we already drove along the lagoon and looked for the water birds. Yesterday we were in Tourlida at the gulf of Patras. There you can not only swim nicely and look at the Peleponnes. There is also a nice restaurant where you can eat good fish and mussels. 

Mobile on land is nice. Nevertheless, we hope that very soon we can be mobile at sea again, especially under sails.

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