There is a huge mountain across the way from our school that has become the favorite past-time for many of the students here. We decided to climb it on Monday afternoon. It is full of thorn bushes & is rugged, but we made it to one of the lower top levels!! From the top, you can see for miles - including a great view of the harbor! It took us 2 1/2 hrs. to make it up & back down, but was well worth it! Hopefully, we'll make it up to the very top level before we leave this place!
An interesting thing about this area of Greece is the huge number of "stray" dogs that roam the streets. We have about 7 or 8 dogs that must love Americans as they lie outside the school on the front walk & wait for some of us to come out so they can accompany us on our walks or runs. Today we had 8 of them walk with us down to the harbor. So far they're really friendly to us & just seem to enjoy the company. They appear in good health & are well fed as people will often leave food out for them & there are plenty of trash cans for them to rummage through. That has been one of the disappointments of this place. It has such natural beauty with the harbor, sea, & beautiful mountains, but everywhere you look around here, there is trash!! Not just a little - but trash cans overflowing & trash blown all over the place. They need a good "clean up weekend" (or month!) to return it to the beauty it could be!
