Author Archives: swo8

Staying Warm

Your quarantine will soon be over. Stay safe and warm and thank you for sharing Mountain Energy.
Leslie

Mountain Energy

If you read my last blog post you will know that I am now in the maritimes, and in quarantine, living in a tiny home(trailer) with my husband. It has been 7 days as of 6 p.m. tonight, Wednesday, October 28th. So here’s an update on how it’s going.

We weren’t sure what the weather would be like when we planned this trip. At the beginning of the trip it was mild, and that worked well for us. Because our trailer has plumbing, we can add water to it, and it also has a water heater and a pump, allowing us to use a kitchen sink and also a shower, which we used, before it started to get colder. It has recently been colder here, and we had to drain our pipes and add some winterizing antifreeze agent to the pipes to keep them from freezing over the winter. So…

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Driving To The Maritimes

I’m glad you two got there safely. It must have been quite the drive. Thank you for sharing with us Mountain Energy.
Leslie

Mountain Energy

Day One

Our first day travelling to our new home was uneventful. The roads were very empty. I saw a lot of transport trucks. There was a bit of road construction going on. It did not cause any delay. The sky was overcast, which made the colours of the green grasses on the roadside, contrasted with the leaves on the trees, in shades of red, orange and yellow, quite pretty. I listened to many podcasts as I drove. My husband and I are each driving our own vehicles and we met up every 2 hours or so to eat some prepared foods we brought with us. We have stopped midway to stay overnight in a hotel. Tomorrow morning, after some breakfast, we will be back on the road.

Day two

We drove in a lot of rain. I listened to a lot of music this day. We were stopped at…

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Oracle of Delphi by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Efharisto in iTunes

Using Athens as our base camp we took a trip by city bus to Cape Sounion. The Greeks chose their temple sites with care. Sounion is about 70 km south of Athens and it is here where the temple to Poseidon stands. It is located on a craggy spur that plunges 65ms down to the Aegean Sea. This temple was constructed about the same time as the Parthenon, around 444 BC. It is memorialized by Byron in his poem Don Juan – “Place me on Sunium’s marbled steep, Where nothing save the waves and I, May hear our mutual murmurs sweep.” Another adventure was a bus trip to Marathon. The Battle of Marathon took place in 490 BC during the first Persian invasion of Greece. It was fought between the citizens of Athens, aided by Plataea, and a Persian force commanded by Datis and Artaphernes. The battle was the culmination of the first attempt by Persia, under King Darius I, to subjugate Greece. Of course a visit to Greece wouldn’t be complete without a visit to Delphi, the home of the famous Oracle. This is where our video and music takes us today. The Oracle usually answered in riddles and left a lot to interpretation.

Epidarus by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Efharisto in iTunes

Staying in Athens made it possible to take several side trips around mainland Greece. Epidarus is roughly a 2.5 hour drive from our base. It is one of the more renowned, ancient sites. It was a sanctuary for Asclepius, the god of medicine. The sick would come here for the cure. It has a theatre area with the most amazing acoustics. A whisper from the centre dias can be heard from atop of the highest seat in the complex. It seats up to 14,000 people. Some of the other sites to be seen in that area were Mycenae and Corinth. Agamemnon was the ruler of Mycenae and much of his adventures are documented in Homer’s Iliad.

Omonoia Square by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Efharisto in iTunes

After a week in Crete, we got itchy feet and had to move on so we caught an overnight voyage to Athens. It was mid October and the winter season was fast upon us. The vessel was almost empty. They had a dessert bar and a bar for drinks, that was about it, just the bare essentials. It was very luxurious compared to where we had been staying. A moon lit night, the crossing was smooth and uneventful. It was 7:00 am when we slid into the harbour at Athen’s port of Piraeus. Taxis were lined up as we disembarked and the hustle began. Armed with the prior knowledge, we were a two minute walk away from the Athen’s Metro, we brushed them aside and continued our walk to the subway. It was raining and at that point we didn’t have a place booked for the night. Our first two attempts to find lodging were unsuccessful. However, we struck pay dirt on the third attempt. There’s lots to see in Athens and it is a central hub to many other locations of interest. Our lodging was a short walk from Omonoia Square, a rather seedy area of Athens, but we were also another short walk in the other direction to the Acropolis.

Mountain Energy is moving!

Way to go Mountain Energy. You did a lot of fine work on your house. The east coast will be a real adventure.
Mom

Mountain Energy

It has been a long time since I have posted something on this blog. There has been a lot going on in my life. For many years I had planned to leave Ontario and move to the maritimes. The time has finally come. I had wanted to do more training in Yoga before I left, but in person training is no longer allowed because of the virus. A friend of mine had recently started his yoga teacher training, and it was going wonderfully, but it has now been put on hold. I can see how this is a difficult time for such offerings.

I have quit my job as an electrician for the TTC. It was something I had looked forward to for many years. It was never the right place for me. Although I am grateful for the experiences I had, and the people that I met there. I…

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Knossos by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Efharisto in iTunes

We stayed in the town of Iraklio while on Crete. Crete has been inhabited since the neolithic times (7000-3000 B.C.) However its history begins with the Minoan civilization. The British Archaeologist, Sir Author Evans made the dramatic discovery of the Palace of Knossos in 1900. Some of the restored parts the palace can be seen in this video. It lies about 5 k. from Iraklio. The city of Knossos consisted of an immense palace, residences of officials, priest, the homes of ordinary people and burial grounds.

Crete by swo8 Blues Jazz from the album Efharisto in iTunes

We were in Rhodes for about a week then we decided to fly on to Crete. Greece consists of a peninsula and about some 1400 islands, 169 of them are inhabited. You could spend a life time exploring the islands and never see it all. To cut to the chase, we choice the two most important islands, Rhodes and Crete. Rhodes is the largest island of the Dodecanese and the Minoans and Mycenaeans had outposts there. Crete, Greece’s most southernly and largest island, is known for its Minoan civilization. The bull was considered sacred and it became a custom for the Minoan girls to jump the bull. Bull jumping was probably performed during religious ceremonies. There’s a famous bull leaping fresco in Crete found in the walls of Knossos. It’s also the first thing you see of this video. I must admit I had a bit of fun with this video.