Lake Kerkini to Kato Poroia on E4: Day 2

A hot, leisurely walk on which I had a coffee at a monastery and saw my first, wild tortoises.
On waking up I found it very painful to move the right hand side of my back. I have had the problem before and the doctor said it was the sacrum-ilium joint. The treatment is to do some exercises to get it moving, which slowly improved things.
Only (!) 19 kilometres today so I had a slow breakfast before getting under way. Leaving Akritochori the E4 followed an asphalt road up to a monastery. As the sign on the door said I was within the opening hours I cautiously entered the walled compound. On entering the church I met a nun who spoke English. Although everything looked very old the Monastery of St John the Baptist  (one might have guessed the name from the fresco above the front door) was actually only 6 years old, and additional building work was still in progress. As the friendly nun explained, everything had been built and decorated in the old style, with lots of handmade "gold" artifacts and traditional icons. While in Britain the established church seems in decline it was good to hear that in Greece they were still raising buildings dedicated to God. The nuns kindly gave me a coffee and a type of shortbread biscuit in the visitor's room and I bought a fridge magnet of St George and the dragon in their gift shop as a way of repaying their kindness (it was either that or hand knitted babies booties for which I would have little use).
After this interlude I continued on the E4 which was now a dirt track through scrubby vegetation. There I disturbed two tortoises. Seeing they had been spotted the first one stopped, and so did the second one on bumping into the first. I left them in peace and continued on my way.
A met a number of flocks of goats and sheep today. You know they are coming from the sound of goats' bells and the goatherd repeatedly shouting "Hi" (to make the goats do something he is not saying hello to you). The noise is a sign you should take defensive action, such as picking up a few stones, as the goatherds usually have a few dogs who do not take kindly to you. I had my walking stick out in preparation.
Temperatures were in the low 30's and the sweat was dripping off my face. It is important to keep drinking (water) in such weather but by now the water in my bottle was hot and unpalatable. So on entering the town square of Ano Poroia I stopped for a Coke, some buffalo ice cream and a few small coconut cakes. Plane trees shaded the chairs and tables in the quiet square and a brook had been diverted to make a little waterfall feature by the small war memorial.
Then it was down the road to Kato Poroia. One more steep hill to climb and I was at Hotel Epavlis. The hotel consists of little apartments and had a swimming pool which was more than I needed. In the evening I ambled down to a taverna in the village. An Australian who had settled in the village for its relaxed and stress free approach helped communicate my simple needs for food (and some wine). All very pleasant siting by the street watching people as they met and separated among the plane trees.
A long walk tomorrow!

Entrance to Monastery of St John the Baptist

Wild tortoises

One of the many flocks of sheep, a shepherd and barking dogs will be nearby

Greece on E4 Long Distance European Trail: Bulgarian border to Lake Kerkini: Day 1

Greece is the tenth country I have walked into on the E4 Long Distance European Trail (more details are on Traildino.com). Today I crossed the border from Bulgaria, visited Fort Rupel, surprising the soldiers, and joined up with the combined E4 and E6 route heading west to Lake Kerkini.
Leaving the comfort of the Hotel Komitite in Chuchuligovo at 7:00 am I walked to the border village of Kulata. A handy cafe allowed me to use up my Bulgarian change on coffee, a yoghurt drink and some baked affair filled with the typical soft, white Bulgarian cheese. No-one was that interested in my passport at the border, it was the trucks they were focusing on, and I was soon heading south down a large valley.
Where exactly the E4 goes at this point was not on any map or Internet site I could find. The road down the valley is a motorway and so unsuitable for walkers, there was a train line that appeared little used but walkers are not normally welcome on train tracks. I started along a side road paralleling the motorway and was pleased to see my first Greek E4 sign, so at least I was in the right valley. The side road turned up into the village of Promachonas. Neither my maps nor Google Earth showed a reliable route beside the motorway for the next few miles. Consequently I followed some tracks up into the hills to Fort Rupel, a fortification which saw significant action in World War II. The route I picked from my maps was a bit overgrown in one part and I was sweating profusely from climbing in the heat, but I managed to reach the War Memorial at the top. In doing so I surprised a group of soldiers who wanted to know where I had come from. No doubt they were expecting any visitors to come in cars up the road. However they let me see the view from the War Memorial at the top and then one kind chap took me into the tunnels. Several kilometres of tunnels were dug into the hills, with white painted walls and medical facilities, offices etc.. A stripe on the wall helped you find the exit. The Greek army held out for 5 days against the well equipped Germans, but the Germans went around them over a different pass. Heading downhill along the official road I passed another soldier at a barrier, who kindly raised it for me, no doubt having been warned I was coming by his colleagues above.
I returned to the bottom of the valley at a location where I knew from my research that I would find a way south. Between the motorway, and the Strymon river which runs beside, there was either a vehicle track or a remnant of an older road which I followed down to the next intersection on the motorway where a road headed off west. There were a few obstacles designed to keep cattle in but nothing that stopped my progress.
The E4 and E6 initially followed this road and marked the point in my trip where I changed from heading south to heading west  After 4 kilometres the route took me into the lively village of Neo Petritsi. At its centre were a group of cafes and tavernas where I had a Coke and Baba cake (a sort of sponge smothered in syrup with some cream). As I sipped my coke I watched what I thought of as a typical Greek scene, people sitting at tavernas with their pavement tables, saying hello to each other or driving by on scooters with no helmets and a child between their legs.
Then it was off along various tracks to Akritochori, the next village. Coming out of Neo Pretitsi there were lots of yellow E4 / E6 signs, some used for shotgun practice, but these soon  disappeared. As I walked along, to my right was a range of mountains marking the border with Bulgaria. A faded "No Photographs" sign alluded to the historic importance of this boundary as part of the Iron Curtain. To my left the plains spread out below the low foothills I was crossing. There were occasional olive groves, a sign that I had reached the Mediterranean area again.
A kilometre or so beyond Akritochori I reached the Hotel Villa Belles and my bed for the night. The hotel looks over Lake Kerkini, where all kinds of birds can be spotted. I enjoyed looking for them from the terrace with a pair of binoculars that I was lent. The birds on the lake were to far away to distinguish but was it a Lesser Spotted Eagle that I saw soaring across the grassland? As the sky turned pinky grey I enjoyed a celebratory glass (or two) of red wine for reaching Greece. Unfortunately the insects were around as well, and I had to fish one wasp out of my wine. It then walked unsteadily across the table cloth.
At over 38 kilometres it was a long day, but a rewarding one, though my back is starting to suffer....

Details of my previous wanderings following the Bulgarian section of the E4 can be found on johnpone4bulgaria.blogspot.com. A gpx file for your GPS of my route from Bulgaria to the joint E4/E6 trail can be downloaded from wikiloc.com or viewed on your smart phone from ViewRanger under shortcode johnpon0035. Once on the E4/E6 east - west route a GPS file can be downloaded from Waymarked Trails or Traildino.com.

The Strymon river I walked beside that took me through the mountains along the border between Bulgaria and Greece. A motorway was on the left.

Entering Neo Pretitsi an waymark visible on the telegraph pole

Lake Kerkini, a haven for birds