It all changed last weekend. December and January were so lovely it was probably one of the nicest, most settled and warm winters we’d experienced since moving from the UK to Greece in the summer of 2005. Of course, the lack of rain elicited complaints from locals about how it was going to mean that next winter’s olive harvest would be a disaster, some areas (not ours, thankfully) might be hard pushed to have enough water to get through the summer, various crops would suffer, all that stuff. I know that there is always some justification for the worries, but I also seem to remember that in the more than five decades of our lives that we spent in the UK before leaving, the farmers there also had some reason to complain virtually every year about some aspect of the weather that was sure to spell certain disaster. And anyway, climate change notwithstanding, doesn’t nature also have a way of redressing the balance quite often? Thus, about a week ago, the weekend of February 4-5, it all changed. The rains came and a cold air mass from up north came sweeping down across the Balkans and we suddenly had reason to crank up the heating in the house.

I mentioned it in passing in the previous post, I know, but that was more about what was coming. Now, as I write this one, it’s come, and it’s meant business. After weeks of balmy warm, sunny winter days, the clouds came and with them the rains, sleet even, and snow on higher ground (and lots of it in places), and we’ve now seen almost a week of daytime temperatures ranging from 6ºC to – if we were lucky – maybe 8ºC. The cat’s been most put out because he hates getting his tootsies wet and he’s been stuck on the veranda and under the canopy on the side of the house for a week, only reluctantly venturing out into the elements when nature called and he had no choice. And don’t start with all this “You cruel people, why haven’t you got a litter box and let him indoors” stuff. It’s Mavkos who won’t come in, it’s not our doing. Yes he loves his cuddles and won’t eat his breakfast until I’ve picked him up and he’s rubbed his head under my chin for five minutes, but if we hold the door of the house open and beckon him in, he just sits there on the mat and looks at us in disgust. I’m sure he’s saying “I’d rather you came out here, if you don’t mind.”

Anyway, don’t worry about him, because we’ve given him a very cozy basket with a nice soft blanket on the bench outside the kitchen window. He’s well away from any wind, any precipitation and even the ground for that matter. The weather, though, has been so unstable that he’s simply not been able to go off on one of his patrols, which sometimes can last for several days. This week, each time we’ve stepped outside we’ve gone “brrrr!!” looked at the thermometer in disgust as it struggled to reach double figures even at 2.00pm in the afternoon, looked up at the frequently leaden sky and stepped right back in again to resume reading on the sofa and sipping hot cocoa.

Yet, all the foregoing aside, even though we have just lived through the longest cold spell in a long time (five or six days, I mean, I ask you!), we still have had a couple of moments of respite when the sun’s come out and we’ve been able to get away from the house for a while. Today, I should say, before I post a load of photos from the past seven days, it’s been back to normal anyway, with long periods of sunshine and the temperatures back on the rise, reaching double figures for the first time since last Sunday-Monday. The worst is definitely behind us, it seems. We even had our morning coffee on the sun loungers, something we hadn’t done since last week, shock horror.

And so to some photos. Whilst when it has rained it’s frequently turned to sleet or hail here in the village, we’ve got off lightly. Only a few metres higher than us altitude-wise there are mountain slopes that rarely see snow which this year are dusted with the stuff still, as these photos taken during our afternoon walk today show…

I can hardly believe this myself, but it’s now 24 years since we had a three week stay with friends in the High Rockies of Colorado, at Snowmass near Aspen, during June. We enjoyed daytime temperatures of around 20-22ºC, whilst all around us the higher peaks displayed majestic snowy caps that were simply awesome to gaze at. Those photos in that gallery above brought those scenes back to mind. The last two especially could easily be taken in the meadows around Aspen in June, they look so much like that region. It is nice, when all said and done, to have winters like this, because Crete is blessed with impossibly beautiful and very high mountains, and they afford us views like those for a few months every winter time. Mind you, in the Lasithi Oropedio just a few kilometres to our north and west, they have a couple of feet of snow at the moment. We’ll admit that we’d prefer living here than up there when the conditions are like that.

Oh, I forgot to explain the photo at the top of this post. I took it on Wednesday on the seafront in Ierapetra. When the sea’s calm you often see a colony of Cormorants gathered on those rocks. They’re amazing birds and this group includes some juveniles, I think, owing to the color variations that you can see if you blow that shot up a little. Of course, there is one rogue herring gull sitting in amongst them too.

Back in August of 2019, when we were looking for a house to buy, we were taken to the village of Episkopi to see one property. It was quite nice, although a little too close to the road and lacking much garden for our liking. Plus we felt that the seller, who lives in Athens, wanted a little too much for the place and was unwilling to negotiate. Well, interestingly, we were back there on Sunday (the next lot of photos are all taken in and around the village on Sunday the 5th Feb.) and got talking to a couple of pappoudes (granddads) who lived only metres from the property we’d viewed. We noticed that the house in question still looked unoccupied and so we asked Manoli, one of the chaps who lived nearby, if it had actually sold, and he told us that it was still on the market. I have to admit, we felt quite smug about that. Manolis too said that he felt that the sellers were too greedy and so they’re still seeking a buyer, whereas me and the missus have now been ensconced in our cozy little home in Markrylia for over three years and counting.

Here we go then, a photographic study of a winter’s day in the village of Episkopi, just north of Ierapetra on the road to Pachia Ammos…

Hope you liked that little lot. To finish off, here’s another shot from our afternoon walk today, it’s of a house (which can be seen from our veranda) just down the valley from the village. As we passed, we noticed a distinguished guest upstairs near the door…

He. or she, looked just as curious about us as we were about him/her.

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