Our mountain road is sealed off for the long weekend to stop any accidental, or not, lighting of fires. Good work municipality and volunteers.
Visitors are allowed as far as our rustic Paradise Taverna. They can't visit the beach below us or the ancient ruins. They're not missing much.
Residents are allowed through naturally. The people on the *blocko are known to us and we are known to them. We stop for a chat before proceeding
- *A road block, blocko or mploko in Greek.
- no 'b' in Greek so 'mp' makes the same sound. Apparently.
- Don't be bamboozled by the greek letter Beta written as 'B' but sounded 'V' in Greek. The Greek alphabet starts Alpha, Veta....not alpha, beta
Greek lesson coming up sometime soon I think.
A strong hot, dry wind has been blowing for days. There are wild fires endangering villages all over Greece. We don't want wild fires around here.
I'm on smoke alert. At any whiff of fire I'm out in the road surveying my realm.
The land next door is full of dry grass and brush. It's a class one fire hazard, abandoned by the owner, who lived in Athens and died recently. His heirs aren't overly interesting. It's for sale and the agent brought up an Albanian to clear it. The Albanian told him to get a bulldozer.
All around us are pine forest and acres of olive trees. They make excellent firewood.
Allways scary Linda....perfect wildfire weather at the mo....
ReplyDeleteIt's a bit worrying but they have good patrols today
DeleteAn Algarve taxi driver once told us unemployed people often start wildfires because they are hired to help put out the fires and get paid. Also a lot of the fincas (smallholdings) had people growing vegetables and preventing scrub and trees encroach. Our countryside is shaped by the livestock grazing it. If the animals or people abandon it or just use it for holiday homes. Mother Nature takes over with scrub..
ReplyDeleteThat happens here, or used to. Fire starters are often caught and it's jail time.
DeleteThere's supposed to be punishment for people not clearing their land. Don't see that happening
It must be a very worrying time with the threat of wildfires springing up. I remember being terrified during a trip to South Africa when the friends we were staying with had to drive us through an area with fires burning both sides of the road.
ReplyDeleteThat's very frightening!! One of my daughters was caught near a fire years ago. She phoned me as she, was leaving the house. I could hear the fear in her voice.
DeleteI'm always afraid of forest fires here too, so many woods and trees around.
ReplyDeleteI imagine it's even hotter and drier there. It's very worrying
DeleteMy daughter faces wildfire risks in their dry season, so I have a bit of an idea how concerned you must feel. I'm glad the road has been blocked and I hope you stay fire-free. Mxx
ReplyDeleteSo far so good. The winds have died down a bit today - next day
DeleteHope you stay free of fires. Max and I lived next to a pine forest and a fire started about 50 meters from our boundary. Very scary.
ReplyDeleteThat is extremly close. The heat and the cracking of the fire is very frightening
DeleteWe have horrid fires here as well. It strikes terror in our hearts everytime we smell smoke in summer.
ReplyDeleteCan the block be fenced off and goats out in to eat the grass down?
Your fires are tremendous. They do so much damage and I remember those vivid sunsets, your photos? The wild goats did quite a good job of clearing that peice of land. Now the water pipes have been fixed they get their water eslewhere and don't come up here. Yes, we do need them!
DeleteI would buy that land (as long as it's not too expensive). It's what we did with the barn behind us, so as not to have a nasty neighbour. Now that my son has sold it, we have exactly that!!!
ReplyDeleteThe land has been on sale for years. He wa asking 3 times the price it should have sold at. And there are so many building laws now because the land is near an archealogical area its just not worth the hassle. I wish someone would buy it.
DeleteSo sorry to hear about your neighbours