From ripe pomegranates and olive groves

Basti was really sad that we had to leave Athens after four days. He would have loved to stay a little longer, but the journey continued to Greek Macedonia (the Greeks would probably claim it's the real Macedonia :D). More precisely, we ended up on the middle finger of the Chalkidiki Peninsula. Basti's ceramic connections struck again, so we sleep in the courtyard of a friend's son, whose parents have a fancy holiday home in Sarti. In addition, two other friends from Koblenz are here, and with the five of us in this holiday home, it almost feels like a shared flat :).

On our trip to northern Greece, we made a stop in Thermopylae. This manageable town in eastern Greece is known for the movie 300. There, no idea how many years ago, 300 Spartans defended Greece against the Persians. A relatively small monument commemorates the battle.
However, we were there because of the natural hot springs at this place. For seemingly millennia, hot sulphurous water has been gushing out of the ground there. Since it was privatized and a spa hotel was built there in the last century, the natural pools have been improved somewhat, so there, for example, a waterfall and individual swimming pools have been created. It stinks terribly and the mosquitoes are hell (I honestly had 30 bites on my legs after getting out of the water), but it's really soothing. We drove there at dusk, as it was 35 degrees during the day and the water is also 37 degrees, and I can really recommend it to everyone.
We didn't meet any other tourists there. Only locals, Romanian truck drivers, and refugees (the hotel is now a refugee center and the people living there really celebrate the springs :D).

Here in the holiday home, it currently feels like we're just on a regular vacation. We spend a lot of time at different beaches with crystal-clear water and different shades of blue, cook together in the evenings, and enjoy the last sun before it gets cooler. In a few weeks, the olive harvest will begin here, there are olive groves all around us, and the farmers are working flat out to get everything ready for the harvest. In the garden of the holiday home, there are fruit trees with ripe pomegranates and grapes. Autumn is slowly beginning in Greece too :).