Some unbelievable feta salad and some skiing too

We were slightly tired from the last night's party, and when we drove down the serpentine road to the sea, we all felt a little sad to leave Kalavrita and the guys behind, but at the same time we were all happy to see some new stuff. The first thing was to get to the sea and to find some food. We got a hint from one of the pisteurs about a nice coastal city with great food, so of course we went there.

When we got to the city, we were a little surprised. There were some restaurants, but the place was filled with not so good looking people. Everywhere you looked, you'd see some bums with leather jackets doing absolutely nothing. As we drove a little further the city's coast road we found out why. There was the biggest marina in Greece and all of bums were probably trying to sneak into one of the ferries to get to Italy. So, it was not the nicest place to have lunch and so we decided to drive to somewhere else for some food.

Next we had to drive over a huge bridge to get to the other side of the long bay that goes all the way to Athens. On that side is Parnassos, the ski resort that we were heading to. On the other side there were too many roads with only Greek signs, so we had to look for a little help from our map. It seemed that Ape had accidentally forgotten the map to Kalavrita. So, no help from that one we thought, and drove to this one gas station nearby to buy a new map. Apparently, gas stations in Greece don't sell maps, so we kind of had to figure things out by ourselves. Well, that didn't work either, so we drove back to the bridge and because the bridge toll was 14 Euros per way, we decided to move some cones and make a super illegal U-turn, haha.

Finally, we found the right road and were going in the right direction. On the way we spotted a nice looking small coastal village, and we just had to pay a visit there. It was a small village with approx. a few hundred people living there, and it had a small marina for leisure boats. There were many really good looking restaurants and we just picked one with the most Greek decorations. We ordered feta salads and cokes and in no time we had them in front of our noses. I have to say that it was the best Greek salad I have ever tasted. All the ingredients were amazing and especially the red onions were fantastic. They were really sweet, instead of the bitter ones we have back home in Finland.

After a nice late lunch we walked to the pier on the marina to take some nice photos of the sun set and continued our way to the next city to find a hotel. The night came fast, but luckily we found one from Itea, a small city really close to Parnassos, so it suited us great. The hotel cost us a mere 60 euros, which is not bad for a 3 star hotel just next to shoreline. 

We woke up quite late and missed the breakfast, so we went out to find a café for some food. When we arrived to Itea last night, we didn't notice how beautiful the city really was from the dark. There were a lot of small cafés just next to the sea, and the fishermen tried to catch some fish to sell to the restaurants from the few piers next to our hotel. One guy got a maybe 10 kilo fish that looked like a mix of tuna and something else, and of course as fishermen, I and Ape were stoked to see this struggle and everything. The town seemed like a sleeping paradise in the middle of nowhere. Too bad that the time wasn't on our side and we had to continue our way towards Parnassos. We got really nice directions from the owner of the hotel and so it was easy to find our way to the ski center.

We got to the ski center at around noon and went to the main lift station to look for a local pisteur, Kostas, a friend of Vasillis, our friend from Kalavrita. Vasillis had called him earlier that we are coming, so that he could show us around the ski center and tell us the best spots to film. We didn't reach Kostas at this time, but they gave us free tickets, so it was a victory for the team anyway. 

Up to the mountain we went. First there was an old cabin with really goofy looking trash bin kind of cabins. It was impossible to fit our wide skis into the boxes outside the cabin in this kind of lifts, so we had to take them inside the cabin with the head of our skis pointing out from the roof. With the cabin you get to the point from where all the chair lifts go from. 

We chose a long chair up to go and see the top, and then skied down to the other side of the mountain to find Kostas. Parnassos is actually two different resorts, one on each side of the mountain, but one ticket works in both. We went to ask for Kostas from this one lift booth, and the guys were so kind as to call him through la-phone, and after a little while Kostas showed up. As a long fit-looking guy he really looked like a pisteur to me. 

Kostas took us around the resort and showed us the best places to film, so it was really easy to plan the next day. Later that day, when we were having after-ski with Kostas, he suddenly wanted us to come to this one ski booth for a special treat. In this particular booth, the lift guys had a head of a wild boar and a head of a goat or something. The heads were grilled in an oven and with some local wine we were to eat them with the guys. The boar was excellent with nice gamy taste and with a little encouraging from the guys I tasted the eye of the boar. And as a big surprise, it tasted really good. 

After this nice treat, we went to ski a couple of runs and then headed to the top for local after-ski. Every evening the guys from the lifts gather and have a cigarette or two and watch the sunset from this booth on the top. Me and Blumi went to ski a couple more runs and then headed down to our car and to find a hotel for the night.

We found a hotel just next to Arachova, a city meant for the rich people. Although everything looks expensive with a lot of fur coats on the shop's windows and well-built houses, it is cheap to stay there. For 20 euros per night you will easily find a place to stay. After some dinner in a local restaurant it was time for us to lie down and have a good night's rest.

Last evening we spotted some nice lines while watching the sunset from the small booth on the top of Parnassos. We went to shoot those, but unluckily there wasn't enough snow to do my line with a big drop, but Blumi went for his. The line was maybe 45 degrees steep with a lot of rocks everywhere. Blumi skied really well if you consider the amount of snow on the face.

After that we went to shoot another line. Ape wanted to ski this one big gully, so me and Blumi went to film it from a hill next to it and Ape started hiking. We got really cold while waiting for him. A storm system was closing in, so it was pushing a lot of air in front of the gully and making really cold high winds. Ape skied really well and we got some nice shots from the run, so the day was a wrap with two sick runs on tape. Later on the evening we went to walk around the Arachova city and just looked what the local people do.

The next day we went up to the mountain just to get some pictures of people and the ski resort itself for the programme. After some nice runs we wanted to go and have a look at Pan's cave. It's a cave on the mountain side, where Pan used to have orgies with a bunch of girls. Not bad for Pan I guess, haha. From the road from Arachova to Parnassos you turn to this really messed up gravel road and from there you'll have to hike for maybe 300 meters vertical to get to the cave. The cave itself is actually really big with a nice small opening, so it really was a great place for Pan to have his orgies. We made a small story about the cave and headed back to our hotel to ask if we could stay for one more night.

The night was the last for us in Greece and we decided to stay at the same hotel and drive to Athens the next day. We had to return our car to the airport, so we had to be there really early. So, on the next morning it was an early start to go to Athens. The first plan was to return the car, leave our luggage to the airport and go see Athens for two days just with the backpacks, but there was a strike. Nothing else than taxis worked, so the plans changed once again. We looked through our footage and decided to head to Romania, our next destination. All though we bought the flights for the same day, we got them really cheap. It seems that it is really cheap to fly around the southern Europe.

What we found from Romania you will hear in my next post. Until then, ski a lot, have fun and take care!

Greece and the best people in the world

Early mornings are my favorite, as if. Traveling for five weeks in a row starts to have its effects on our crew, but we still manage to get the job done. We were so super tired when we got to the other side of the sea, from Turkey to Athens. Although we were in Greece, the transportation can be anything, so the first thing was to rent a car. It is so much easier to travel in your own vehicle, so that you can stop if you see something interesting and go check it out. 

We rented a four by four SUV from Hertz for a quite nice price. Only for 70 Euros per day, and I can say that it was totally worth it. In these so called warm countries they don't have any winter tires or winter chains, so four by four is a good option, if you are heading to the snowy mountains as we were.  The rental guy was kind enough to give us a map and some directions to how to get to our destination.

The first place to visit in our schedule was called Kalavrita, which is approx. 200 kilometers from Athens. It is a small mountain village quietly resting at 950 meters above sea level, and it has a ski resort just above it. The accommodation is cheap and the atmosphere amazing. From the village of Kalavrita, you will have to drive for maybe 15 minutes up the serpentine road to get to the ski resort at 1850 meters, so the car really was a nice option. I couldn't find any clue about any buses going up to the mountain. To Kalavrita itself you can get by train, and I bet the ride is going to be really memorable, as the train goes through tens of tunnels and over tens of bridges on its way up the mountains sides.

We got to Kalavrita village at around 11 and drove straight up to the ski resort. The resort isn't really that big, but it has a lot of tree runs and some really nice looking steep lines that are definitely doable after a good snowfall. Too bad that this year it seems that everywhere, except in Japan and the States, it really is a bad winter with very little snowfall. 

We got the lift tickets and went up to find some spots. When we got to the top, we saw that on the backside of the mountain exists some really steep stuff to ski. There were some really good lines, but no snow, so we decided to stick with the tree runs.   

While I and Blumi were filming some scenery, Ape started chatting with one of the pisteurs called Vasillis, and he was more than happy to show us around the ski resort. We found some good snow, some good tree runs, and we were good to head back to the village to plan the next day's filming.

Vasillis invited us to join him and some of the locals for after-ski, but first we needed to find a place to stay. We found a nice hotel just next to the village center, so it was close to all the cafés, where we could relax after all the long days of filming at the ski resort. We got our stuff to our room and headed to Event Café, where the guys normally go for a beer after a long day of work on the mountain. It was nice to meet some local riders and talk about skiing in Kalavrita and Greece itself. We even got a small interview out of one local snowboarder, Gustas, who later became a very good friend to us. Gustas really lives for the riding, so he felt like one of us straight from the beginning. 

The locals invited us to their apartment for a few more beers, and of course we went. Apparently, the boys love to play poker, but due to my and Blumi's bad luck in such games, we decided to let the boys play and just watch. We also watched some epic ski movies, and after a long while, it was time to head home for some rest before the next day's filming. 

On the last day, we had spotted some runs that we wanted to do, so it was easy to start filming. We got some great shots in a short time, and after a dozen nice ones, it felt like the day was a wrap, so we spent the rest of the day just chilling and filming some people in the ski bistro. They even have a snow park in the ski resort, just next to the bistro, so of course we had to go and do a few laps with Blumi. Too bad the guys had closed the biggest jump, because they had some film crews coming the next day. They told us that we are welcome to hit the jump the next day, though. The sun went down at the park, and it was time to head back to the village for some dinner and after-ski. Only this time the after-ski was just a fast beer, and then we had to rush to the grocery store to buy something to eat before it closed. 

We had a stow in our hotel room, so we figured that it would be fun to make something of our own, since we had only eaten restaurant food for the past 5 or 6 weeks. We bought some pasta, cream, onions, garlic, canned tomatoes and two different local sausages, which all together turned out to make a one hell of a pasta set. Blumi also got some weird white wine to go with the pasta, haha. The food and the wine were good enough and there was plenty, so everyone was happy. Later on we just hanged out in our room and watched what we had on tape from the laptop, and pretty soon after that it was good night for us.

On the last evening, when we were checking out the day's footage, we became surprised on how much good stuff we had got and how easily it had come. So, the last day on the mountain was fast planned to be a really mellow day with just a couple of lines, and the rest of the day to be spent hanging out at the snow park with the locals. We filmed the two lines that the boys had in mind, and then headed to the bistro for a beer and to do some park riding on the snow park next to it. Blumi gave Vasillis' brother some tips with his 360's and we tried out the big jump. With just a little more kick on the jump and it would have been perfect, but the guys still had made some excellent job with the jump last evening. We watched the sunset and headed back to the village, once again stopping at the after-ski place, haha. 

A couple of days earlier Vasillis told us about some get-together that they were planning on having, and now he invited us to join them. They told us that they have this similar thing once or twice every year and that it is going to be a blast. We gathered our stuff from our hotel room, checked out and then followed Vasillis car for 30 kilometers out of Kalavrita to the next small village. There was this nice small tavern, where the party was happening and it was packed. Earlier, Vasillis told me that there was going to be a lot of people, but I never would have expected over 30 friends from the resort and its surroundings come together for a dinner. 

The party itself was also something I could never have even imagined. When we were walking towards the tavern from our car, Gustas told me what we were having for dinner; a cow's head that his friend had brought. First, I thought that he was joking, but he was actually dead serious. They part the meat from the cow's head and then serve it on different plates with different parts from the head on each plate. Some of the local skiers are actually farmers, including our happy guide Vasillis, so it seems they have a pretty nice supply of meat on their hands. With all the meat on the table, they also served some coleslaw, feta, fries, sausages, spinach pie, and of course some really good homemade wine. Old Greek tunes were playing, everyone was laughing in their own clicks and every time you finished your wine, someone just filled your glass. They appeared to have an infinite source of this wine, hid in the back room of the tavern, haha. The evening literally flew by, and soon we had to head back, but to where. We forgot that we had checked out from our hotel the same day, so we had no place to go. No worries thought, one of the guys made a phone call and we had our old room back, nice.

The next morning it was time for us to say goodbye to Kalavrita, hello to hangover and head to the next place in our tight schedule, called the Parnassos. We started our engines and there we went again, ready for a new adventure.

What happened on that trip you will find out in a few days.

Thank you and good night.

Some coffee and sightseeing in Istanbul

Although I have lived most of my life in Helsinki, I have never been that much of a city person. In Marrakech all the exhausts made me feel sick, Casablanca was just too packed, Dubai artificial and Beirut just a big mess. Still, Istanbul with all its cafés and filled-with small alleys to wonder around made me feel great. It has been quite a journey through different countries with both the cities and back country. Blumi likes cities more, where I and Arto are more into the peace and calmness of the nature. We kind of complete the lack of each other by our differences in our opinions. Here is what Istanbul was for us.

As I earlier told you, we arrived to Istanbul at night and the only agenda was to find a hotel to get some sleep after the long drive. The next morning we had to return our rental car to the airport and leave most of our luggage there to make the sightseeing a little easier in Istanbul. Like in many other big cities, in Istanbul the easiest way to get around is the Metro. There are maybe five different lines and two of them are actually trams. We took a metro from the airport and in 30 minutes we were in the city centre. Luckily, Ape had been in Istanbul a few years back, so we kind of had a guide inside our group. 

First we went to see the probably biggest tourist attraction in Istanbul, the Hagia Sofia, which was an old mosque that was turned into a museum. It is amazing how they were able to build it in the beginning of the sixth century and finished it in just 4 years. Just next to Hagia Sofia is the Blue Mosque, which is also totally worth seeing.

Next Ape wanted to take as to Taksim, which is the shopping district of Istanbul. Taksim is filled with small alleys and cafes and it really was my and the boys favorite place in Istanbul. We spend the day just walking around Taksim area and sitting in many cafés and just looking at the swarming masses of people. 

Istanbul really is a big city with its 15 million residents and you can see this especially in Taksim. The streets are packed with people and sometimes it is hard to get through the masses. 

Evening came and it was once again time to find a hotel. Taksim is full of small hotels and hostels, and you can easily find decent priced accommodation. We got ourselves a nice small hotel for 20 Euros a night and the hostels are even cheaper. 

We took a short nap in our room and after that it was party time. Istanbul is well known for its party scene and we wanted to see it with our own eyes. We bought a couple of beers and went out to the streets. You really can feel the beat of the city at night time and as Taksim is filled with bars, it is not hard to find some live music or a disco, and basically everything you need can be found in Taksim. We wanted to see some local live music, so we opened our ears and after a few minutes we found a nice small bar with a guy playing a sítra. We didn't find the bar by hearing the music, we heard a guy yelling at us 'come here come here!'. This is very common in Istanbul and other big cities and you don't want to follow these guys if you are not absolutely sure that they will take you to some place nice. They can, and will cheat you and steal your money. So don't follow them into small alleys or so, because there probably is a guy waiting for you with a baseball bat rather than the fanciest disco in town.

We enjoyed the music over a beer for a while and then headed out to find a disco. In Istanbul disco is a disco and night club is a place where you go if you want to pay for everything, including food, drinks and your company, if you know what I mean. We found a disco once again through one yelling guy and he promised us that the place is packed. He even offered us two different sets. One including the entry fee and one drink and the other included a full board – as much as you can drink, I guess. The price wasn't that bad, and as promising as the full board sounded we weren't in Istanbul to get wasted, so we went for the one drink deal. Well, the place wasn't packed, there were just a few guys dancing on the dance floor and maybe one or two girls. First, we thought that had we come into one of the many gay-discos in Istanbul, but probably it was just a quiet night with less of girls out, haha. After the party mayhem in this disco we headed back to our hotel for a rest. 

On the way we of course had a couple kebab rolls.

The next morning we started the day a little later and walked to the first bridge that connects the two sides of Istanbul. The bridge is filled with angling fishermen, and we saw many different weird-looking fish and the atmosphere was really chilled out. 

It was nice to just slowly walk through the city and see the local lifestyle and not so much the touristic junk. On our way to the direction of Hagia Sofia, we found a nice hotel just next to it to leave our stuff, so that it was a little easier to walk around. As in the one before, the price was same 20 Euros each for the night, not bad. 

We went to film some time lapses and found a really crappy restaurant. It seemed that they had no kitchen and after we ordered our iskender kebabs, the guy just went out of the restaurant to get them, probably from one of the kebab stands on the streets, and left us alone in the restaurant. Ape started doing some splits and goofed around and we all laughed hard. After a lousy dinner, we headed back to our hotel to do some writing and I spent a couple of hours talking with the receptionist about the situation in Muslim countries and about some of his future plans to open a hotel chain. He really was a nice guy, not in the gay way of course, haha. Hopefully his business turns out good. 

Later Blumi and I went out to film the last stuff we needed from Istanbul, and some bastard stray dogs gave us a hard time trying to be in every single shot that we filmed, haha. Back at the hotel we ordered an airport shuttle to come and pick us up in the morning, because we had really early flights to the other side of the sea, to Greece. 

I will let you know how that went in a few days.