Sunday, October 10, 2010

Bike Tour Day 6 - Akrocorinth to Xylocastro

The next two days are all about CLIMBING.  All hail the conquering Minnesota flatlanders on their 30 lb. hybrids with fat tires! ;-)))

We awoke to a dramatic sunrise - a 7 AM greeting to a big day:

"Sunrise on my shoulders..."

After fueling up at the buffet, we got on our bikes to attack the climb to Akrocorinth, the ancient citadel which hovers 1,850 feet above our sea-level hotel - and is only a 4.9 mile climb - an average of 15% grade! Yowser!  But we did it - slowly - and enjoyed the moment at the entryway at the defensive wall:

Zia and June enjoy the moment

The next challenge was hiking up to the actual inner citadel, quite another adventure in hiking - you can see from the previous picture the footing was not hospitable.  But, every vista was a reward in itself:


Yes, we are heading to that distant wall!

At times it was as if we were looking out the window of an airplane - without the plane!

"Cross-check and all call"


Climb-Climb-Climb

We had spectacular sights through the highest defensive wall - anyone trying to attack this spot would be too tired to shoot straight!:


You'll have to take my word for it -
but there is another fortress on that hill beyond

On the return DOWN Peter took a lovely picture of Old Corinth ruins in front of the Akrocorinth site we had just biked up to - yes, we were all  the way UP there:


The tiny jagged edge on the far hill is Akrocorinth!

So we returned to sea level - ready to EAT - refueling for the relatively flat 25k to Xylocastro:


Awaiting the chow - from left -
Nancy, Bill, Jeff, Zia, Linda, Jeff, Rick & June
(Guides Patricia and Manolis standing in back)

We arrived safely and happily to the hotel:


View of Xylocastro from our balcony

We visited town, had cookies at the bakery, sat in the square while Peter sketched and I surfed the web using the public square WiFi (how cool is that?), and then CHOWED on salad and pizza!  My motto - eat dessert first.

An interesting note - as I was entering the Day 5 blog in our hotel room, Peter and I experienced our first, and hopefully last, earthquake - not kidding.  The room bounced up and down for about 15 seconds.  It was a 4.5 quake in the middle of the Gulf of Corinth, about 20k away.  We were all fine, as was the building, but it gives new meaning to being "shook up".

So - 42k later we are anticipating the "really big day" tomorrow - 74k to Kalavrita, climbing through the Vouraikos Gorge, described in our guide sheet as a "grueling" 26k climb reaching 3600+ feet from our sea-level start.  I've never seen the Experience Plus guides use that adjective...hmmmm...time to get some sleep.

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