In 2009, to celebrate Rachael's 50th birthday, we finally got around to placing Greece on our cycling agenda. This had actually been at the top of the list when we started out cycle touring together: in 1991 we were in the planning stages of an epic bike/camping adventure that was to take us from Paris to Athens, including a ride down the coast of what was then Yugoslavia, passing through Kosovo and then dropping into Macedonia. Those plans crashed with the breakout of the first of the Balkan wars, and we went to New Zealand instead.

We're older and wiser now, and our trips are a bit less ambitious. We've given up the tents in the interest of lightening our loads, and shortened our days to allow for more time off the saddle to look around; and, of course, we're 15 years older.

The plan for this year's tour is a 3 week cycle loop of the Peloponnese, followed by two weeks ferry hopping through the Saronic and Cycladic islands. The biking is mostly front-loaded, since the cycling possibilities on some of the islands we want to see are pretty limited. Also, we figured that after 3 weeks of climbing through mountainous southern Greece we'll be ready for a change of pace.

There's not too much to say about our equipment and traveling style. We both rode stock Cannondale touring cycles, and carried as little equipment and clothing as seemed wise and decent. The big addition for this trip was a pair of Kindle readers - we both read a lot, and we were experimenting with electronic readers as a way to cut our load down further. Also, as with our previous trip in Japan, we were led by our handlebar-mounted Garmin GPS's, following routes I'd mapped out at home in Portland. Mapping out bike routes in the Mediterranean is a great way to day-dream through the rainy winters of the Pacific Northwest.

Our flight to Athens had a bit of a hiccup - we missed a connection in Frankfurt, and didn't arrive in Athens until after midnight. By the time we arrived by taxi at our hotel it was after 1, so we didn't see any of the city.

Heart

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