M.C. Escher meets Dr Seuss

Once upon a time M.C. Escher and Dr Seuss got together and decided to build a stairway up the side of a cliff that led to a delightful waterfall in Potami on Samos Island in Greece. I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, but seriously that's the only way to explain how this staircase came to and continues to be - it bafflingly defies all odds. The great thing is that it isn't even the main event! The main event is playing in the pools of magical Potami.

It's worth the ride to Manolates

Through the Valley of the Nightingales and up the mountain from Agios Konstantinos is a village filled with pottery, quaint cottages, and delicious grub. To say "up the mountain" really doesn't do justice to this ride. The forest is every level of green and life teems all around you. It feels more like the backdrop of a fairy tale than it does a Greek island. The road switchbacks severely and climbs at an angle that is definitely inappropriate for a FULLY loaded bike tourist. The only thing that kept me going was the desire to see what the forest could do next and as rewarding as the forest was the true reward was in the gem that lay at the end of the road - the village of Manolates. It was worth the climb and I'd do it again - shhh don't tell Basil.

Grape Harvest

The vines are heavy with grapes, the smell of fermentation is in the air, Greece is busily producing this years harvest of tasty wines. Samena Golden is the pride and joy of Samos. It continually graced my glass and will be sorely missed on future dinner tables.

Ride around Kerkes

The best paved road in Samos takes you to Drakei. Rising up from the beach at Limionas the road winds steadily up the side of Mt. Kerkes. At pretty St Nicolas church the ride turns drastically to offer up breathtaking views of Fourni Islands and Ikaria and some of the most isolated and rewarding traffic free pavement on the island. Passing through Kalithea the road rolls through beautiful thick pine forests that bend over the road and fill your lungs with deliciously clean air. My only lament is that this road should go on forever, but of course it doesn't- it ends abruptly in Drakei. The good news is that the ride back is twice as lovely especially when accompanied by an overnight in the pine forest - you might even hear some jackals.

Call of the Wild

Finally off to do some extended exploring around Samos by bicycle our first night found us tucked away from civilization under the above rock. So well tucked away were we that we went completely undetected by the pack of jackals that couldn't resist the hypnotic call of the waxing moon. Startled by their unearthly crooning some 10 meters from our feet, we both sat straight up unsure of what we should be feeling...danger, awe, honour.

Blamed for attacks on livestock, the golden jackal has been hunted to near extinction in most of Greece, but they are still heard and occasionally even seen in Samos. Unfortunately, the startled sounds of well-equipped Canadians jolted out of a dead slumber is even more scary than a pack of baying jackals and so our jackal friends scurried away as smoothly as they gave in to their call of the wild. In the end what we felt was deep regret that we didn't catch a glimpse of these increasingly rare critters that were so unwittingly close to us.

Walk through Ano Vathy

A stroll revealed the most charming quarter of Vathy. Ano Vathy twists up the mountainside that rises up away from the port and main town. 19th century turkish style buildings tottered dangerously overhead while we meandered over the cobblestones, and steps, and twists, and turns dodging motorcyles, scooters, and occasionally even cars.

With so much to look at in such a cramped place I always feel like I have to catch my breath when I make it out of these piled up chaotic old places.

Chalky Church

I love the chalky layers of whitewash on this pretty little church. Every time I ride by I can't take my eyes off it. For some reason I just want to sink my teeth in to discover the buttery shortbread cookie that must lay below, but I already have one chipped tooth and the door is locked so I can't go in to see the guilded gems that glitter away beneath this chalky exterior. Instead I settle into a bench and enjoy the whitewashed floral walkway that leads back up to the main road. What a delicious spot for a little rest.

3km to Turkey

I sit on the beach a few minutes from where we are staying and I think...I could swim to Turkey from here. It almost seems crazy that this is Greece and that is Turkey and they are so completely different, but not all that different in so many ways. Looking at borders in this part of the world is just absurd, talking about them is even more absurd. At the turn af the last century when nationalism was just being born, people in the fields of modern day Greece identified themselves as Christian or Muslim or Jewish and not Greek, or Bulgarian, or Turkish. The trouble in this region comes from the fact that the lines are so blurry and the people such a historical migrating hodge podge of things. This migrating hodge podge continues just the same as it always has.

I can't count the number of times a local has leaned in to us and told us that the place is being taken over by Albanians. Yet I have seen a little of everything working behind the scenes in Greece, legals and illegals alike - Poles, Bulgarians, Albanians, Ethiopians, Pakistanis, Iraqis, Afghanis...

Almost every day when we ride down the beautiful switchbacks into Vathy, we pass two or three young men who are clearly making their way up from where they beached in Murtia to register as refugees with the Samos police. I can't help but wonder what they've left behind and what mix of hope and despair must reside in their bellies as they make that walk over the island and a little closer to the next chapter of their lives. As I see them walking into their new lives with just one small plastic bag of "stuff" and the clothes on their back, I feel trivial riding past them with my perfectly planned bike with all the right technical gear that allows me to play adventurer in just the smartest way.

King Kouros

In green, green Samos between 538 and 522 BC there reigned a man named Polycrates. Now good ol' Polycrates was a bit of a megalomaniac. On the sight of Hera's rumoured birthplace he built a temple 4 times the size of the parthenon and adorned it's road with at least 6 of the largest kouros statues known in Archaic Greece. These were no regular statues, they stood 5.5m high.

The kouros that stands in the archaeological museum of Samos is a massive sight to behold, but most remarkable for me was how beautifully the veins of the marble cooperated to highlight the contours of the hamstrings, glutes, lower back, and elbow of the statue. If this guy was ever painted, it must have been a sad day when that beautiful veining was covered up, not to mention the sadness of the day these colossal fellas were knocked down, broken up, and carried away to incorporate into the walls and steps of people's homes and public works. imagine that! this guy's parts were found all over the hellenic ruins of Pythagorio. Back then, people were a little better with the whole reduce, reuse, recycle thing.

Plum Season

The tiniest Charlie Brown tree bowed heavily under the weight of these lovely damask plums. Wise food wizard Chryssa boiled them down into some of the most deliciously sweet tart jam that begs for the savoury embrace of tahini and bread.

Green, Green Samos

"Geez, ya know, Basil - I really like Samothraki. It's so mountainous and so green."

"Well, just wait until you see Samos. Samos is really beautiful and all that too."

I laughed knowing that he had to say that, I mean, he's from there right? There seems to be some unwritten rule in Greece that you must love where ever you are from most of all. Many times I have asked Greek people to tell me about their favourite place in Greece and almost as many times they have told me that their hometown is the best place in Greece. Growing up in a place that most of of my peers thought quite negatively of, I found this to be quite a refreshing change, but after a while it starts to sound a little like brainwashing. However, once again, Basil was right: Samos is really beautiful, and really green, and has a sizeable mountain range.

In ancient times, people believed that anything you planted in Samos would grow to epic proportions and it is clearly still a gardener's paradise. Looking down into nearly any valley the variety of trees is astonishing and unlike any island we have visited yet. Samian wines, especially those from the vathy grapes, are internationally proclaimed.

Samos is a gem of an island from the first sighting.