Paleochora Inidri Gorge

So far I’ve done two twelve kilometre walks along the coast. Today I do a relatively short five kilometre gorge descent but I have to walk six kilometres up another gorge to reach my start point in the small village of Inidri. After the descent, I have a five kilometre walk back to Paleochora.

I set off from Paleochora and a narrow road forks away from the seashore after about a kilometre. I now face a five kilometre uphill walk. The first section I walk actually along this road. There is no traffic so it’s not too bad. The road enters a gorge and takes the only route possible towards Inidri.

As I cross a bridge across the gorge, I come across a goat halfway up a tree!! It is standing on a branch about three metres off the ground. I take a photo of the goat but I am worried that it might fall off the branch. The goat doesn’t seem worried so I walk on.

I leave the road and head up a steep slope towards a large rock buttress though olive trees. This is quite hard going as the gorge opens out a little and the sun is hot. Then there is a track under the buttress and I walk along to meet the road just entering the village of Inidri. It sounds a short walk but five kilometres uphill is never easy even in the morning temperature.

I arrive at the small taverna in Inidri more hot and tired than I like to admit. As I look in the door, I am handed a glass of iced water. “We’re closed until midday when we do lunch” I look around and there is a lady cutting potato chips by hand and, in the kitchen, they are cutting large slabs of pork into smaller chunks.

“What are they making?”, I ask.

“It’s pork cooked in wine” the young lady answers. She has lived in Hillingdon, a suburb of London, but much prefers life here in a tiny village. Her father is Greek and her mother is English accounting for her very distinctive West London accent. She does not want to return to London. She is content. “It’s nice here,” she says happily.

She gives me a flask of iced water and agrees to make a bowl of yoghurt and honey for me. There’a nice view across the valley from the taverna and I sit looking at it as I enjoy my cold water and the food of the Gods. The balcony overlooking the valley is very airy, cool and relaxing. I realise that staying here for two hours just to have lunch is probably not a good idea.

I can smell the pork being sealed in olive oil but it is still only ten o’clock so I leave the taverna headed for the gorge. But, before I start the descent, there is a very old church in the village which is definitely worth a visit.

It’s the church of St George. There are some icons around the tiny building but it is the fourteenth century frescos by Ioannis Pagomenos, John the Frozen(I presume he found the sea water as cold as I did!) that are the most interesting feature here. It’s a reminder of how old these tiny settlements in the mountains really are. The walkways are still incredibly crude but the views down the gorge are wonderful.

I make my way down a rough path passing a couple of men rebuilding a dry stone wall. It looks beautiful and I tell them so. They greet me in the customary manner and smile, probably thinking why such a crazy man would want to suffer a trek through that rocky gorge.

I soon reach the beginning of a serious descent. This is no walkway. It requires a little rock climbing of a sort we normally call “scrambling” in England. As I am on my own, I attempt to be careful by keeping one hand to the rock on the more difficult scrambles. There are quite a few vertical drops with jug handles but a number which are not so easy. Halfway down there is a classic water slide which is perfectly smooth all the way down with nothing on either side to steady the descent. But somebody has left some strands of string at the top which helps to lessen the length of slide necessary to reach the bottom. I had been warned that there were three difficult obstacles in the gorge and that this waterslide was the worst.

I try to take some photographs but the scenery is so “in your face” that I have to use the maximum wide angle on my camera to fit even a little of it in. This was the case on the way up to Inidri and it is even more so now. I take photos all the way down the gorge but I know they will not accurately represent the scene.

I meet some Germans from Köln walking up the gorge. They have wisely driven along the track to the bottom and will walk up a little then return. This seems a great idea as they can enjoy the flowering bushes and take their time ascending. I even tell them what they are cooking in the taverna. From the look they give me, I gather they may change their plans and go all the way to the top!

Eventually the path becomes a little less steep and flattens out as it approaches the shore. I spy a tiny beach cantina with a chairs and tables in the shade. By the beach the breeze is cooling and refreshing.

I talk to the lady running the place and persuade her to cook me some spinach “pies” (pastry filled with fresh spinach, wild greens, dill and wild fennel fried in olive oil). People in the table next to me assure me that she cooks these tradional pies better than anyone else in Crete. I also discuss with her a recipe for the “Fainting of the Immam” which she makes in a very different Paleochoran way from the rest of Crete. She lives in a house just out of the town on the East side. Her family has been there for yonks. Opportunists as they are, they have set up this cantina on the basis of “Build it and they will come!” And here we are!!

At the next table is a group of English people who have moved here. They look fairly healthy unlike the many alcoholic expats I have met so far around here. I learn a lot from listening to these people. They are all, including alcoholics without exception, extremely intelligent people who have made life choices that must be to the ultimate detriment of England. A couple of nights ago, I had talked to a man who was desperately hoping I was a chess enthusiast. Another person with a very responsible university teaching post found that life in Paleochora was more rewarding than the valuable work she was doing in London University. Another couple spend the summer in Paleochora and the Winter in the Canaries.

Rick, Maureen and Linda, on the table next to me, seem very happy and even philosophical about life in Paleochora. It turns out that Rick and Maureen actually live in Inidri village. They are vegetarians but they help out in a restaurant run by a couple from Boston (the original Boston in England) on “Steak Night”, the busiest night of the week.

“Would you like a lift back to Paleochora?” says Rick.

“Of course! I’m not a masochist!”, I reply, remembering that I had walked this track two days earlier. It’s very dusty and a little unrewarding even though it runs alongside some beautiful beaches.

Inevitably in Paleochora, as in any small community, everybody knows everybody else. They ask me about the studio I am renting as it has only just been designed and built by Manto. I tell them that everything works and the decor is very tasteful. I even have an orange bathroom! They are suitably impressed and drop me just outside my studio. Nice people!