My Big Fat Greek Adventure, Part 1: Thessaloniki, Mt. Olympus, & Meteora

We weren't planning on traveling for Spring Break, afterall, it feels like we just arrived to Kyiv! But then there was a crazy deal on airfare and a bit of research showed that spring in Greece is the best time to visit (if you want to avoid the heat and crowds), not to mention that Funny Guy is a walking encyclopedia of Greek mythology (thanks Rick Riordan), so we decided, why not?!

Athens is less than 3 hours from Kyiv, but it took us a bit longer to fly up to Thessaloniki where we rented a car to drive down to our Airbnb rental in Leptokarya, at the base of Mount Olympus.

We stopped for dinner on the beach before heading to the house for bed.  That was when we discovered that Darling Daughter had forgotten to bring her sweatshirt.  And I had grossly underestimated how cold the wind chill would be.  Still, it was beautiful and we soaked in the waves, the castle up on the hill, the sunset.  We were really in Greece!

The next morning, we split up.  We dropped My Man off to meet a group of paragliders, then the kids and I drove up into Mt. Olympus National Park to hike part of the Mt. Olympus summit trail.

 The weather was cool and threatening rain, but we set off anyway, undeterred.

Originally I'd hoped to hike from the trailhead in Prionia down to Litochoro, but realized that might be too ambitious for the younger kids.

Instead, we opted to hike from Prionia on the E4 trail to the old Monastery and then back.  It was perfect and allowed plenty of time for stopping to climb rocks, look at bugs, and take pictures.  (For someone with even smaller hikers and two adults, it would be possible to drop off hikers at Prionia, then drive back down to the monastery and leave the car there, hiking up to meet the rest of the group to make the hike even shorter.)

The trail was gorgeous, along a raging creek, through forest, with lots of rocks to climb and flowers to admire and interesting terrain.

By the time we got to the monastery, sadly ruined by Nazis in WWII, but undergoing some renovations now, Funny Guy was starting to tire and the rain that had been threatening all day began to fall more seriously.

Cold, wet, and a little tired, we opted to head back on the road for a shorter trip and were rewarded by seeing several dramatically colored newts (which Young Man gallantly scooped from the road to save from unhappy martyrdom by the cars).  One was so grateful for the help that he climbed right up Young Man's leg.

The kids were real troopers and didn't complain at all in spite of the cold rain.  I guess it was a small price to pay to hike on Zeus' mountain.  It may have helped that we played one million games of I Spy and Contact and laughed and laughed and laughed.  I may also have resorted to a super secret stash of Cadbury chocolate eggs, AKA energy capsules, to help ward off melt-downs.  By the time we got back to the car, this was our view:

Still, when asked if they would do it again, all three kids gave a resounding "YES!" and so would I.  In fact, I hope I have the chance to go back some day and hike the full trail, hopefully not in the rain.  

Meanwhile, the weather hadn't cooperated for My Man either.  He and the other paragliders had a chance to check out the launch and got one quick flight but then the rain interrupted any plans to fly more so My Man was forced to enjoy a delicious lunch with a gorgeous ocean view.

By the time we got back home, though, the sky was starting to clear, so we joined My Man to head back up to the local paragliding launch.  At the top of the hill there is an old church, more than 600 years old actually.  "That's older than the United States!" My Man exclaimed.  His instructor laughed and said, "Everything in Greece is older than the United States!"  As if to prove the point, My Man ran off the mountain, then flew off toward the beach, circling around a beautiful old castle along the way.

That evening, Funny Guy and I took a walk to the beach, where we spent the rest of the evening watching the sun set and practicing skipping rocks into the calm water.  It was beautiful.

The next morning, the kids and I had to leave before the crack of dawn to drive inland to Meteora, a collection of old monasteries perched dramatically and sometimes precipitously on giant rock outcrops.

After some interesting GPS instructions, we managed to arrive just in time to join our hiking tour.  It was fantastic.

The guide had grown up in the area and knew every legend, story, and trail.

He pointed out interested old trees, told stories about the wild boars in the area, and pointed out good photo ops.

He put up with the sibling squabbling that accompanied our three kiddos and told so many good stories that Funny Guy forget to get tired until the 5-hour tour was finished.

We saw several of the old monasteries and went inside the Great Meteoron Monastery.

Although I probably would have explored more extensively if I'd been there on my own, the kids were ready to head home after our tour, understandably tired out after two days of hiking.  It was a great outing, though, and we all highly recommend the Visit Meteora tours.  The day was beautiful, warm and sunny, no evidence of the previous day's rain, so after we got home, we prepared an early picnic dinner to eat outside.  After a few minutes, we heard My Man.  What?  The kids started looking around to see where he was.  I looked up.

Sure enough, there he was soaring high above our picnic on his way to a beach landing.  Funny Guy and I hopped in the car to go pick him up.  Incredibly, he was finishing an epic cross-country flight from the other side of Mt. Olympus!

It was the longest flight of his career, and arguably the coolest.  I couldn't believe that he managed to fly directly over our house from so far away!  And landing on the beach, with the beautiful red poppies waving in the breeze and the beautiful blue ocean behind was really the perfect ending.

My Man pointing to Mt. Olympus (where he started the flight) and then to the beach where he landed.

Sadly, it was the last paragliding day until the end of the trip, but it was a flight to remember.

That evening, My Man and I visited Platamon Castle, then ate out at a traditional Greek Taverna with the other paragliding pilots who were visiting from Switzerland.  Just bring us your very best, they told the restaurant owner when he came to get our orders.  What arrived was a sampling of mouth-watering salads, cheeses, and meats.  The five of us feasted and feasted and still couldn't finish it all.  It was the perfect ending to the first segment of our Greek vacation.  If we had had to leave Greece and go home right then, it would have been worth it.  Lucky for us, however, we still had almost a week left!

The next morning we drove up to Thessaloniki, traded our rental car for a spot on the train, and headed down to Athens for our Big Fat Greek Adventure, Part 2.  

Two Nights and a Day in Paris: Part 2

After our stop at the Arche de Triumphe, we got back on the bus and headed for a day-time view of the Eiffel Tower, soaking up stories of Parisian history along the way.

The tower was just as impressive, but different, in fully daylight.  I'm glad we got to see it both ways.  Funny Guy was dubious about climbing the stairs so My Man took him to a cafe while Young Man, Darling Daughter, and I tackled the stairs.  The sun was shining and the views were amazing.

The climb went faster than I'd expected (mostly thanks to Young Man and Darling Daughter racing each other to the top with me trying to keep up) so we took out time at the top soaking in the views before taking the elevator down for another perspective and meeting back up with My Man and Funny Guy.  Next stop, The Louvre.

Most important, of course, was the opportunity for that classic shot of each of us touching the tip of the glass pyramid.  No matter how goofy other people look posing, we still each secretly wanted our own turn.

I wasn't expecting to get to see much during our brief visit to the Louvre (after all, according to Wikipedia, "the Musee du Louvre contains more than 380,000 objects and displays 35,000 works of art in eight curatorial departments with more than 652,000 sq ft dedicated to the permanent collection."  Just reading that made me tired! 

Still, we were excited to see the Mona Lisa and a few other pieces at least.  We joined the hundreds of other tourists thronging the mysterious smiling woman. 

It was definitely the most popular and crowded piece in the museum, although we also hit all the others in the "Top 5 famous pieces in the Louvre" including a sculpture by Michaelangelo.

Although I had made my peace with seeing only the highlights of the museum, My Man had other ideas and made a valiant effort to see everything, literally everything.  

Funny Guy was more interested in finding a place to sit than in critiquing the masterpieces on the walls and soon the boys found a bench and begged a rest.  Darling Daughter was intrigued by the museum's iPad guide, however, and wanted to find a specific vase.  My Man was up for the challenge.  It was in an obscure corner of the museum and it felt like we saw most of the Louvre along the way, but finally we found it.  Still there was so much more to see.  By then, the sun was setting and the view from the Louvre was almost as impressive as the collections inside.

By then, I was eyeing the boys' bench with envy, the jetlag catching up to me full force.  

Reluctantly, My Man admitted that although it might be possible for him, it wasn't physically possible for any of the rest of us to see the entire Louvre in just a few hours.  Besides, our river cruise was waiting.  Reluctantly, he gave in and we went out to eat some dinner we'd packed and wait for our bus.  It took its time coming, so we explored the area a bit, enjoying the gorgeous architecture and cuddling together for warmth.

The river cruise was the perfect finale for our trip.  We saw many of the highlights we had already seen before, but from a new perspective.

The lights and the river combined for a beautifully romantic good-bye to the beautiful city of Paris.  The next morning, after feasting on macaroons and fresh French cheese and eggs, we re-packed our bags and boarded one last plane, ready to explore our new home for at least the next two years.

Two Nights and a Day in Paris: Part 1

I've been procrastinating this blog post for a lot of reasons.  First, even though we were only in Paris a day and a half, we took about five billion pictures.  Kind of overwhelming to think about sifting through those.  Plus, I like them all, so how to choose which ones to post?  Second, we are living in Eastern Europe and have had plenty of new adventures to take our time.  And laundry.  And homework.  And Russian study.  And, well, you get the idea.  Still, our time in Paris was magical and I don't want to forget a single part.  And I've caught the flu, so I suddenly find myself with some downtime in bed.  So here goes.

Somehow we squeezed all of us and our stuff and Grandma into Grandma & Grandpa's truck the morning of February 6, 2017.  We have a saying in our house, "How many can you fit in a car?  Always one more!"  And the same seems to hold true for bags, and adults, and cats too.  It was tough saying good-bye after spending so much time with family.  We were so grateful for their generous hospitality in putting up with us so long.  There were lots of hugs and they probably would have lasted a lot longer, except it was cold and we had a flight to catch, so eventually we made ourselves wave a final good-bye and walk away.

Then we had to consider the logistics of navigating through the airport with all of our suitcases (filled with everything we'd need to survive our first few months in Kyiv, including such essentials as Chocolate Chex cereal and gluten free macaroni and cheese--seriously, you can't put a price on such things!).  Somehow we managed and got everything checked in.

The 10-hour flight was long, but nothing compared with the 36-hour traveling ordeal we faced when flying home from Chiang Mai.  Still, Weasley was unimpressed, and even sedated he complained a lot.  And escaped.  More than once.  Seriously, this cat would have impressed Houdini with his skills (the flight attendants, however, were not impressed).  Our seats were split so Funny Guy, My Man, and I were together and Young Man and Darling Daughter were together (with Weasley).  More than once, when I was on the verge of almost nodding off during yet another movie, I'd notice a commotion and see passengers looking down and around.  And I'd sigh and realize he'd gotten out again.  Then I'd have to try to catch Young Man or Darling Daughter's eye so they could go find him.  "Make sure the zipper is tight closed!" we'd hiss across the aisle.  "It is!" they would promise.  Needless to say, that carrier gets one star from us on Amazon!

Funny Guy missed most of the excitement, sleeping almost the whole way.  The best part of that was that when we arrived to our hotel (all 10 large suitcases, 5 rolling carry-ons, 5 backpacks, and the 5 of us somehow smashed into a minivan for the trip from the airport), he was ready to party.  Perfect timing!  The rest of us were ready to sleep.  We compromised.  He gave the rest of us an hour to rest while he read before I caved and took him swimming.  Sidenote: Our apartment from airbnb was wonderful.  An old house just a block from the river and Notre Dame Cathedral with this beautiful pool in the basement, two bedrooms, and a kitchen!  We couldn't have asked for better. But I digress . . .

Funny Guy was dying to go swimming, so we snuck down there while Darling Daughter, Weasley, and My Man slept.  Young Man thought about swimming too but decided he wasn't done dreaming.

And with such medieval surroundings, who could blame him?  I think I caught some winks somewhere in there, but mostly I was too excited to care too much about sleep anyway.  After a couple hours, Funny Guy and I set out to explore the neighborhood and track down some groceries.

My phone was dead, so I didn't get any pictures.*  That's a pity because walking around Paris was enchanting.  We found that we were less than a block from the Cathedral of Notre Dame!  So beautiful.  The winding alleys and cafes were bustling and wonderful.  The little shops we found were fantastic but a little overwhelming.

I had a cheese sales lady take pity on me and recommend a type of cheese that "even Americans can appreciate."  She also set me up with fresh butter and eggs.

The shop next door was overflowing with beautiful vegetables and fruits, of course you couldn't choose anything yourself and since I don't speak any French, there was a lot of pointing and pantomime.

I passed longingly by the bakery with all it's delicious smells and vowed to sneak back later without our little celiac man to grab a fresh croissant.  He caught my longing glance and said, "Mom, if you eat any of that, then you are a traitor."  Well, so be it, I wasn't going to leave Paris without eating a Parisian pastry.  Sorry kid.  I'm not the one with celiac disease!  Still, the blow was softened when we discovered that macaroons are gluten free.  So the next day I used up all our left-over euros on macaroons for My Man and the kids and a beautiful melt-in-your mouth heavenly croissant.  I didn't even try a macaroon, just to make it fair.  I think Funny Guy figured it was an okay trade.

*These shop pictures are not mine but representative of what we saw; still it was all better in real life!  In fact all of Paris was better in real life (and yet we took a million pictures and I can't bear to delete any of them, even the 873rd picture of the Eiffel Tower . . .)!

I'd packed some food as well, so when we returned I fixed a simple dinner to lure everyone awake from their naps, then we set out for the Eiffel Tower.  The walk was enchanting, past bakeries, beautiful old buildings, cafes, chocolate shops, and more.

My favorite part of Paris ended up actually not being anything in Paris at all.  It was the reaction of Young Man and Darling Daughter to the Eiffel Tower.  As we approached, I saw these kids, who are seemingly unfazed by anything--jaded by too many awesome travel opportunities and growing up in Asia--these kids who put up with our trips and respond to my near-constant exclamations of "Isn't this amazing?!?!" with "Sure, mom," I saw these kids literally stunned speechless, jaws hanging open as they stared, drinking it in.

Young Man, who had reminded us that no, actually, visiting Paris was not on his bucket list, but he would go along with it for our sake, stared up at the massive, beautiful structure, and said, "Wow, this is way more impressive than I thought it would be."

Darling Daughter glowed with excitement.  Funny Guy decided it was worth the excruciating walk after all.  I was in love.  With Paris.  With the Eiffel Tower lit at night.  With this moment with my family.  With our lifestyle that makes it possible.

I'd planned to have everyone walk up the stairs to the viewing platform, but unfortunately, my research didn't uncover the fact that the stairs close much earlier than the elevators.  We considered taking the elevators but the lines were long and it was cold.  Darling Daughter was sure that her life would not be complete without a trip up, however, so we vowed to return the next day for a new perspective.  By then, Funny Guy couldn't walk another step, so My Man and Young Man gallantly offered to take him back on the bus.  Darling Daughter was enchanted with the city, so we opted to walk home along the river for some more views of the sites.

We got more pictures that don't do the evening justice, saw so many beautiful sites, and ended up at the Cathedral of Notre Dame, beautifully lit for the evening.  It was perfect.  An evening with my daughter that I will always treasure.

We slept in a little after a jetlaggy (aka restless) sleep, enjoyed breakfast, then set out to see the Cathedral up close.  It was amazing.  Absolutely huge and wonderful and beautiful.  Pictures really don't do it justice, though of course we shot a bunch trying.

The day was cold and we underestimated it a bit.  I was freezing all day (I think everyone was) but amazingly no one really complained--there was too much to see!

After the cathedral, we walked down the island to get onto our hop-on, hop-off bus to see the rest of the city.  It had an audio guide and was a great way to see everything without subjecting Funny Guy to any more cruel and unusual punishment (aka "walking").

We stopped for a few minutes at the Arch de Triumphe, the beautiful memorial that honors all those who fought for France in the French Revoloution and Napoleonic Wars (as well as housing the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier for World War I).  Although we didn't opt for the trip to the top, it was a powerful monument.

That was not the end of our adventures in Paris, not even close!  By then it wasn't even noon.  But the rest (including climbing the stairs of the Eiffel Tower, exploring the Louvre, and our Cruise along the Seine) will have to wait for another blog post.  Let me just say that up to this point, things had been going even better than we could have hoped, with happy kids, happy parents, and a great itinerary, pretty much everything I could have hoped for.