Greek hospitality
Athens, 28th May to 6th June
Paul, the French bike traveller I'd met in Italy and travelled with, arrived in Greece two weeks before me and stayed in a community space west of Patras. While he was there, he met another cyclist. In fact, they were introduced by accident by one of the people running the space: he mistook a loaded cyclist for Paul and waved him over before realising his mistake and inviting him to stay too. Paul and the new guy, Titouan, got along well and rode together around the south of Peloponnese for the next two weeks before their plans diverged with Paul going to Turkey.
In my hostel dorm in Athens, I'd spotted that one of the five other beds was occupied by a bike traveller. The next afternoon, I found out his name: the very same Titouan. It was an incredible moment - we'd both met Paul by luck on the road, and now by luck we were sleeping in the same room in a city of three million people. It seemed impossible, especially alongside the coincidence of meeting the Belgian couple on the road for the second time a few days earlier. Mine and Titouan's paths would only briefly cross, though: he was leaving the next day to go deeper into Greece and I wanted to spend some time in Athens.
My travelling companions of recent days, the Belgian couple, would also soon depart as they continued on their way towards Turkey. It's the nature of travelling this way that everything is ephemeral - each day might bring new landscapes, cultures, and friends, and yesterday's are gone. It forces you to appreciate the moment you're in, the place you might not return to, the people you might not see again. I always feel a bit of guilt whenever I take some time to stay in, or skip a particular noteworthy thing to do, but it's important to be able to slow down as well. If you're living your whole life in motion, sometimes you have to take a day off to actually rest - not like a short holiday where you can frantically run around sightseeing and do the boring stuff when you get home. Inez and Jo, the Belgians, had clearly learnt this well in their nine months on the road. They seemed to be comfortable with staying in a bit more while in Athens, and we met for a home cooked dinner at their accommodation before parting ways.
I didn't like Athens much at first. After arriving through chaotic outskirts traffic, I'd only seen the central areas near my hostel, filled with the types of annoying businesses that inevitably arise in any heavily touristed place. Undoubtedly the streets were beautiful with their ancient ruins and views of the Acropolis, but look around and you'd see you were surrounded by flimsy souvenirs and enthusiastic restaurateurs inviting you to come and have some authentic Greek cuisine. I found the supposedly trendy and anarchist neighborhood, Exarchia, quiet and somewhat gentrified, too. Admittedly, it was a Thursday afternoon, not the most buzzing time anywhere, but I was quite underwhelmed. Disappointed in the city, I fell back on at least doing productive errands and headed to a bike shop further away from the centre in search of an insulated water bottle.
I left the bike shop six hours later, without a water bottle but with two new friends. Patrick, the owner of the bike shop (a sole trader), was excited to hear about my journey and we had plenty to talk about while intermittently tinkering on my bike. Although he didn't have the smaller chainring I wanted for climbing hills, we fixed my kickstand, cleaned my drivetrain, lubricated my cables, and replaced my chain. I'm keeping the old chain as a souvenir: the trusty piece of metal that took me from Milan to Athens. He also taught me how to adjust derailleurs, a skill I'd never had before. He's clearly passionate about his work, trying to make Athens a bit more of a cycling city through his shop, and it even functions as a bit of a social space for regulars and some local children. A few hours into our chat, another friend of his showed up and we all went for some food together. I mentioned that I'd only booked my hostel for one more night and Hauke, Patrick's friend who had met me fifteen minutes earlier, offered to let me stay with him on his boat. Naturally, I said yes. These moments are without a doubt the best thing about unplanned journeys and I was very excited to see what this new experience would be like. It helped that I would have some time to assess his character first (result: friendly normal engineer), as the three of us headed out to a city park art exhibition for the evening.
For the next four days, I lived on Hauke's boat in the marina, hanging out with him and Patrick in the evenings. We got into a bit of a rhythm, regularly cycling up and down from the marina to the city centre, about ten kilometres, with Hauke going fast on his road bike and me desperately trying to keep up. Despite first impressions of car chaos, Athens is actually kind of good for cycling. Drivers are so unused to bikes that they give you plenty of space, you can filter by trailing the ubiquitous scooters, and on wide roads the rightmost lane is often half occupied by parked cars, giving you a quasi cycle lane in the remaining space. Cycling from the city centre to the marina is a constant downhill and you can seriously fly down the main roads - it's great fun. Obviously it would be better to have prevalent safe infrastructure (beyond the city's single bike lane that I took every day) but I found cycling around Athens surprisingly non-scary once I got used to it.
My opinion of Athens completely flipped in those days. It was perfect weather, apricot and strawberry season, and I wasn't surrounded by tourists anymore. I was seeing the 'real' Athens, living and hanging out with locals, and I loved it. I didn't even visit the Parthenon. I spent time on the boat, in the beautiful (privately funded) national library, at cafes, and at the city jazz festival with Hauke and Patrick. On Sunday, we went for a day sail on the boat with a bunch of other friends - a cool new experience, and I got two more invitations to stay with people: from Patrick and from another friend of Hauke's who pitied me only being able to use the boat toilet. I took up Patrick on his offer, since I'd spent four days on Hauke's boat and didn't want to impose too much. My days staying with Patrick were something new again: riding on the back of his scooter, helping a bit in the bike shop, and seeing the city through his eyes - he'd been a university student in Athens, and Exarchia was much more fun when we went to the right places at the right time.
I'd originally been planning to cycle from Athens to Thessaloniki, but with how long I was staying in Athens that was becoming impossible given that I was meeting a friend in Sofia (a bus ride from Thessaloniki) on the 8th. I'd been considering taking a train north most of the way and cycling for three days or so, but in the end, I decided to just enjoy my time in Athens with my new friends, and just take the train the whole way to Thessaloniki. It would be fun to see Greece's only decent train line, too. Cycling is an important part of the journey for me but it's not the fundamental part - it's a means to an end, and my real goal is to connect with the places I'm passing through. In the countryside, that can mean riding through nature, and in cities, that can mean staying still and hanging out with the people that make the place. I'm definitely a city person, and it's not just the food, it's the fundamental fact that a higher population makes it more likely you can find people who share a niche interest. In Athens Critical Mass, which was not a large group, I even happened to meet someone who had seen me with my loaded bike in Corinth, a fabulous city-enabled coincidence. I think my metropolitan inclinations make me a bit of an outlier as a bike traveller, but I'm quite happy with the balance I've found.