America 1 + America 2 take a trip: DAY 14: A visit to Hades

Wednesday and Saturday mornings in the city centre, Kalamata residents swarm into the market place, a vibrant stretch of colorful stands. Not a single word of English is spoken, and JJ and I were the obvious outsiders in this ritual of Greek culture (ok, maybe it was my camera that gave it away). As we meandered from stall to stall in amazement, vendors tried to catch our attention by talking loudly, no doubt trying to promote their prized produce, but it was all in vain, as (regardless of the volume) neither of us understood a word.

If the excessive amount of citrus groves overridden with ripened oranges didn't give it away, the numerous orange stands announced the arrival of orange season. The local orange crop, splayed along the fringes of the highway and decorating inner city streets, provides a substantial portion of the current market stock, and JJ and I (lacking our typical orange stash we've been lugging around) decided to invest in a few. The stall we plucked our oranges from had every variety imaginable, and we each filled a plastic bag with the best oranges we could find. I was a bit suspicious of JJ's bag, however, as she has a particularly keen ability to subconsciously pick the worst fruit available, as evidenced by her daily bruised apple in the dining hall...

Upon weighing our bags, the vendor and JJ negotiated the price. And by negotiated, I mean we had no idea what the original total he stated was, so JJ tried to hand him a €20 note, which he said was too big (in hand gestures, of course). After digging out the change from her wallet, JJ tried to hand him a variety of coins, totalling somewhere between €5 and €8 (I wasn't paying too much attention, not that this detail is really important). He picked out €1.50 from the coins in her palm, and proceeded to give her an unknown amount of change, one coin at a time. We had accrued enough oranges to last us a few days (we tend to collectively eat about 6 oranges a day) at a fraction of the commercial price, but decided to explore the market a bit further, as it had taken much less time than we thought it would.

It's impossible to convey the environment, but if the market was a river, it would be swelling at the banks about to flood. Perhaps the funniest stall we came across was in the fresh seafood niche, which had a distinguishable stench seeping into the main walkway. I was merely trying to get a few pictures of the spread of ocean creatures before us when the butcher made her way over to us to inquire as to what we were interested in. Unable to say that we didn't really want anything, just to take a picture, she interpreted JJ's hand motions as 'please let us take stupid pictures with your fish', and proceeded to grab an octopus and shove it into JJ's hand. At this point, I was dying laughing, while JJ was trying to avoid the impending Kodak moment. Needless to say, JJ was forced to hold the octopus and smile. On an even funnier note, there was no way for her to rinse the slime off, much less wash her hands.

Following our market adventure, we set off to find the Caves of Diros, two hours south along the same winding coastal stretch the we drove the day before. After some creative navigating on JJ's behalf (she refused to follow signs... don't ask me why), we made it out of the imbroglio of Greek drivers in Kalamata proper and hit the highway. Pedal to the metal, we made it to the caves and beelined to the bathrooms. That might not matter to you, but it was an urgent matter at the time.

A handful of Euros and a short drive later, we bailed out of the car and waited for the next tour group to enter. You may be wondering why we would pay for a tour of caves when typically, one enters the cave and follows the footpath to the exit at a leisurely pace. But, these were no ordinary caves—upon entering the mouth of the cave, the damp footpath leads to a dimly lit landing stage for a fleet of blue boats. As water dripped on us from overhead, we were instructed (we think... it was in Greek) to get in the boat our guide pointed to. We eagerly took the front seats and our adventure along the River Styx was about to begin, with a modern day Charon to punt us towards the underworld.

The boat wobbled as we lurched into narrow passageways and around tight bends in the waterway. Soda straws, ribbons, stalactites, stalagmites, and columns filled the cave and were so near that I often found myself leaning sideways into JJ to avoid being smacked in the head. JJ, as tense in the boat as I am in the car, thoroughly enjoyed my displeasure at the water that dripped constantly down my back and onto my head, as her side of the boat tended to be drier. At various intervals, the deep voice of our guide echoed through the cave, creating an all too realistic atmosphere, accentuated by a Cerberus shaped column at one point. We (once again) had no idea what he was saying, but the couple behind us informed us that one of the chambers we drifted through had water depths exceeding 30m. After another series of low arches and tight channels, the boat was turned around and we jolted into the landing stage. Watch a part of our tour! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=se6AK4UnTcA) Ignore the clicking sounds... that's just my camera trying to focus...

We proceeded to munch on our lunch (including fresh strawberries and salted cashews from the market) sitting on the edge of the pier in the cove where the caves were conveniently located, then hopped in the car in search of a beach. As we drove south, we planned on taking a side road to the town farthest west of the Taygetos mountains which loomed to the east—we assumed that being the farthest, it must be the most beach-like. After finding the correct road, following it into a small village along the way, and winding up in someone's driveway on a cliff edge, we deserted that plan and headed back to the main road.

The twists and turns of the highway south led us past many a scenic view of the rocky coast, but not a single sandy beach was found and our gas tank began to empty without a gas station (or town) in sight. As the road neared it's end, we came across a sign (which I found hilarious) for the 'LAST Gas Station'. Needless to say, we pulled in and one of the men that had been sitting in front walked over to help us, as all of the gas stations in Greece are full service (or maybe women aren't allowed to pump their own gas? We don't know what Greek women do, we haven't actually seen any outside of restaurants and grocery stores). Oh, did I forget to mention that we only had €16 in cash? About this time, we (JJ) didn't care that the gas was the most expensive we'd seen the entire trip, at €1.79 a liter.

'If they don't take card, we can try to sell them oranges.'

Only slightly amused by my suggestion, JJ dealt with the transaction—which, fortunately, was paid for on credit card. With a full tank of gas, we continued south for the final 20k of the road, which ended in a sandy beach! Success! I am definitely the best navigator JJ could have asked for. However, clouds had rolled in and the wind had picked up, and neither of us were up for a swim in the cold water. We (JJ) turned the car around and we sped off to find ourselves another castle!

About an hour later, we found ourselves on yet another tightly cornered road on a cliff (this seems to be a trend) which led to a castle, also on a cliff (the same cliff, to be exact). Not as impressive as Paleokastro, yet still pretty cool, this castle was difficult to explore, as the inner walls had all deteriorated into large piles of rock, surrounded by knee high grasses and wildflowers. It was also no surprise that the locals had also gone to the trouble to plant olive trees within the castle walls. After conquering the western and southern ramparts, we decided to venture to the northern wall which bordered the gorge. This was no easy task, as JJ was wearing flipflops, I am prone to trip, and the 'path' was barricaded by a mess of trees, undergrowth, and the remains of former buildings.

Whilst the northern expedition did not involve stinging nettles, a less avoidable barrier slithered its way between the two of us as we neared the final portion of the trek. I, for one, have an immense hatred of snakes, and JJ was not terribly keen on blindly marching through (in flipflops) what we now realised was an area that potentially harboured more of our scaled companions. As neither of us were familiar with the local snake varieties, and could not identify the third member of our exploration party (much less see the entire thing—there was low visibility due to its chosen path inbetween large rocks and thick bushes), we chose to end our quest and begin the journey back to the hotel. Lame. I hate snakes.