Happy Birthday to Ed! A lovely day for a BD, in which we have a lot of wandering planned to celebrate. See how pretty?

Of course we have a car – when don’t we have a car? (Well, on Thursday we won’t have a car…but we’ll get to that later!) At any rate, the car kiosk is right at the port, where we sit in the terminal building waiting for the Hertz guy to show up (yes, we are early, again…..when are we not?). Eventually we are on our way with a nice little compact. Our first plan had been to go to Bostoni and Amphipolis from here – it is about the same distance as from Thessaloniki – but then Ed found this cool nature park – The Nestos preserve, so we ditched the ruins for the environment. Fair trade.

It is an easy hour and a half drive to the Delta preserve where the Nestos lakes are located. We find the little information/Park center easily enough, although there doesn’t seem to be anyone there. There are lots of displays and some decent brochures, and a restroom. The most important thing. A ranger appears from the back room when he hears us flush the toilet and proceeds to give us an overview of the National Park and the lakes here. He gives us a map, apologizing that it is only in Greek, but he points out all the spots we should go and gives us directions, so all is well.

We start off on Lake Vistonida, driving around the perimeter, past the Holy Monastery of Saint Nicholas, perched out in the middle of an estuary, and park off a dirt road the ranger told us about. From here we begin a nice little hike down dirt roads around lush estuaries and ponds -looking for birds – which are all over the place, but we’ve no clue what they were – and we never could properly get them in a photo. This is a huge bird sanctuary – the ranger even asked us if we had binoculars (miming the use of them as he didn’t know the English word) – which of course we do not. Regardless, we were able to find and photograph lots of insects, bees and butterflies populating the flowers along the lane. Still, it was an excellent walk through very pretty scenery.

Striking out from here, we tried in vain to find some dam the ranger told us about. He even gave us directions, but we got lost following the “turn right onto a side road that goes along the main road” and ended up out in some working farm field with farm vehicles heading our way. Deciding the dam wasn’t really worth it, we turned around and drove out to this great little beach town called Fanari where there were lots of cute houses and businesses circling an inland lagoon as well as on the actual waterfront of the Thracian sea. It was too early for lunch, unfortunately, but we did stop to walk the beach a bit and take some photos.

Retracing our steps, we headed back out of the park, stopping at the Monastery to take some photos. We had to wear wrap around skirts and dress (since I had on a sleeveless top) but it was worth it to walk across the bridge that spanned the estuary to access the lovely little Monastery and beautiful chapel.

Continuing on our trek, we turn inland toward the Nesto River Gorge where we plan to go hike along the river. The directions are a bit nebulous, but we’re going to just blindly follow our GPS and see if we can get to one of the many trail heads beside the river (yeah, well, this actually works for a change!). As it is about time for lunch, we start looking for places to stop along the way, but there is absolutely nothing. I mean, we aren’t on a major highway, but more industrial roads where you would think there would be a restaurant or cafe. nope. Not to be. We end up stopping at a Shell gas station that turns out to be the best bargain in the world. Not only do they have a full cafeteria style buffet, they also have a mini-K-mart type shop up front with everything you could ever want – including a new belt for Ed, whose old belt had bit the dust a in Ireland, where we found a replacement, but it didn’t last even this long. So for a grand sum of 15 Euros we have lunch of 2 huge baguette sandwiches, a beer, 2 bottles of water and a new leather belt. The belt actually cost less than the food!

About 20 minutes from the station, we actually find the turn off for the River walk and navigate our way through farm fields and a little town to the end of the road at the Galani area of the Nestos River Gorge. Next ensued a fabulous hike along the river on the totally amazing stone walkway that ran above some abandoned railway tracks. Spectacularly gorgeous with craggy overhangs and incredibly views up the river.

You could even climb down to the railroad tracks and hike the tracks through all the tunnels and around the river until – well – I don’t know where! No way we were doing it – do you see those stairs? Yeah, that was the only access to the railroad tracks. Um, nope. Ain’t no way we’re risking our lives down those treacherous things. We’re quite happy up above, on the relatively safe rock and concrete walkway, thank you very much.

So, we continued on our way, intending to hike for about an hour out, then head back. Which was a grand plan, until the thunder. And lightening. A huge storm was brewing up ahead – and while it may or may not have reached us – just like at home, we’re in the mountains and the microclimates play havoc with the weather – we decided to turned back out of extreme caution!! Of course taking many more pictures along the way.

Back at the parking area, we stopped, along with all the locals, at the Kantina traveling food truck for a beer and wine and water, sitting at little tables alongside the river. A nice little reward for our exercising today. Then got back in the car and headed for the port since it still looked like rain. Of course by the time we got back to Kavala, there was no rain in sight. Figures. And it was way too early to turn in the car, so we decided to try to go to the castle tht is perched up above the town. You can see it from just about everywhere.

Um. Not!! We made it up the hill on what we thought was a narrow street – until the GPS told us to turn left….up a truly teeny tiny narrow little walled alleyway. There was a directional sign on the wall pointing to the Castle, so the GPS was actually correct. But, oh no, no, no, no. Not a chance in hell we are driving this car up there. Abort! Instead we drove to the end of the street – literally – and parked in front of the Greek Orthodox church up there, with the statue of Mehmet Ali (Mohammed Ali – the real one), who was a general and founder of the Egyptian dynasty. We walked around the square and the church, looking for a way to walk down to the lighthouse that showed on our maps, but the only way we could find was down a set of rock stairs leading to a rocky beach promenade that apparently, eventually led you around to the lighthouse. Again. Um. Not! We’ll pass on the lighthouse. At least there are great views overlooking the harbor up here.

After reconnoitering a bit and deciding for sure that we couldn’t get to the lighthouse (yeah, we’re like a dog with a bone), we ended up at Cafe Briki, a little cafe/bar with equally good views and wine. Plus, it is a super cool little place with great decor. Can’t argue with that!!! 

Making our way down the really narrow lane (I actually asked the bartender if the road went 2 ways – it was so narrow, we wanted to make sure we weren’t making a mistake), we easily navigate our way back to the terminal where it is still too early to return the car. We parked where we picked it up, in front of the terminal building, then went back aboard to hit the bathroom and dump our gear – finding our room all decorated for Ed’s BD – then headed back outside to wait for our Hertz guy who said he’d be back by 4:30.

He had told us he had another pickup at the airport, but he’d be there, he promised. Well, 4:30 came and went – but he did call and said he’d be there any minute. Since we had our loyalty club event at 5pm, we were cutting it close. Eventually I left Ed to wait so I could come back aboard to get ready. Fortunately, the Hertz guy showed up moments after I left, so Ed soon followed and all was well.

We made it to the event, then to the balcony to stare up at the castle that thwarted us and watch the sailaway, then onto Prime C Steakhouse for a birthday dinner celebration, where our waiter was quite relieved when we told him he did not have to sing Happy Birthday to Ed (and also quite pleased when we told him to take the rest of the cake back to the galley and share with everyone), and finally to our balcony to watch a wonderful sunset call it an evening.