“Spartan”: a most unrealistic definition

A fine ravine for throwing babies. Though we didn't see any...

The Oxford dictionary defines “spartan” as “showing or characterised by austerity or a lack of comfort or luxury”. I’ve always imagined no cushions on one’s chairs, or not wearing a jumper in winter. That sort of thing.

As such, that would be a Serious Understatement of what it was like being a Spartan, particularly a Spartan man.

Basically, Spartan society wasn’t a sort of worthy, monk-like, lack of material possessions. Spartans weren’t simple, frugal souls. They were ruthless warriors who threw weak babies down a ravine and encouraged their teenagers to go into the countryside and slaughter slaves.

Spartan boys (the ones who weren’t thrown into the ravine) only lived with their mothers until they were seven - from then on they stayed in all-male barracks, where they were toughened up by being underfed, suffering ritual beatings (until they bled - and no flinching or crying out allowed), and being sent out of town armed only with a knife and told to survive. If they hunted down and killed a few “helots” (conquered citizens of other states, who were made into slaves and did all the work in the Spartan fields) so much the better.

Once they turned 20, these charming, sophisticated men became full members of the army (the only job available) and they continued fighting until they were killed or, less likely, reached 60 years old. The Spartan army was the scourge of the region - a good many fortress cities were built by neighbouring states to try (often unsuccessfully) to keep the rampaging Spartans out.

One of the rules of being a Spartan warrior was you didn’t get taken prisoner - you returned from a battle either with your shield (victorious) or on it (dead).

That is until 425BC, when in a battle against their long time foes, the Athenians, at Sphacteria near Pylos (10km or so from where we are in Methoni), a few hundred doomed and surrounded Spartans threw down their shields and surrendered. This un-Spartan-like decision shook the ancient world, and the smug Athenians were prompted to be especially aggressive over the next few years. Serve those wussy Spartans right.

Anyway, back to what I was saying about the word “spartan”... whether they had any cushions in their bedchamber or wore a woolly vest under their robes when it was cold would seem to be quite beside the point.

A glorious morning swim

It should by rights be raining in Methoni. Certainly the local olive growers are worried about the impact of the dry weather continuing well into October. The olive harvest will start at the end of the month and without rain, yields will be lower and the olives more acid - or so we've been told. 

But for us feckless travellers, yet more beautiful sunny Greek days are just a bonus. We hope to be based in Methoni (on the bottom left hand corner of the western-most Peloponnese finger - see map at the very bottom of this blog) until early November, because some lovely friends of my father have lent us their holiday house. And the town is looking wonderful. Tourist numbers are right down, so its attractions - a dramatic waterfront castle, a sandy beach, a harbour full of picturesque little fishing boats, and some nice tavernas - are mostly just for us. In the sunshine.

Methoni harbour

The weather means we've been able to continue with our pre-breakfast swims - just a wonderful way to start the day. In Methoni we tend not to swim from the beach, but from the rocks under the castle walls - it's such a spectacular spot. I took some photos this morning of our route from home to our swimming place - along the top of town, past the castle moat and the fishing boats and down to "our" harbour. Gnarled Greek men were tending to their boats, or bringing fish back in open crates on the back of their mopeds, and the castle (and Geoff) were looking very fine in the morning light.

Here's a blow-by-blow view* of our swim - or at least the walk to get there. Isn't it a fabulous place? (*Surely you can't have a "blow-by-blow view"? Horrible writing - ED)

Setting out towards the castle

Walking down towards what used to be the moat. 

The castle's front path. Wouldn't mind one like that...

Nearly at the beach. This area is also used as the boatyard by the local fishermen

Walking towards the swimming spot below the castle. Note the fisherman on the scooter. He'll have been out in his little boat this morning and is bringing the catch home on the back of the bike.

Perfect timing. He stopped to have a chat to his mate painting his boat, just as I had my camera out. You can see the colourful plastic bowls on the back of the scooter. That's for the fish.

A shot of the harbour, with a fisherman on his boat

A rather better shot, not looking into the sun, but without the fisherman

Geoff about to take the plunge. The water isn't warm, but we've swum in worse. And it is October...

The promised map of Methoni - thanks to Google

A short rave about plastic bottles in Greece

You can drink the water out of the tap almost everywhere in Greece. It's clean, safe and tastes fine. But, like elsewhere in the world, bottled water is ubiquitous, and Greek consumption is growing. Every tourist restaurant we've visited on this trip has automatically brought out a large plastic bottle of water. Multiply that by 30 million visitors a year, plus all the local consumption, and that's a lot of water bottles.

You hear about the problems of worldwide plastic waste all the time in the media, but I admit I hadn't linked it to my Greek bottled water consumption until yesterday, when a walk along the rocky coast north of Methoni highlighted something that isn't unique to Greece, but is pretty horrible. (Click across below for three debris bottle shots)

Thousands of plastic bottles washed up on the rocks. OK, it wasn't just plastic bottles - there were also jandals/flip flops and plenty of polystyrene. Also the odd area affected by past Mediterranean oil spills. But the plastic bottle debris was the worst. The great Greek plastic bottle garbage patch. And the closer we got to Methoni, the worse it got. 

Nice bit of oil, just as a break from the plastic...

One of the problems, apparently, is the Greeks aren't great at recycling. They've been fined for several years running by the European Union over their lacklustre attitude to responsible rubbish collection. But still, the green-lidded municipal bins all over town (where Greeks are supposed to take their recycling waste) are far more likely to be full of ordinary rubbish (and cats) than plastic bottles.

Instead, plastic bottles seem to get dumped. Sides of the road, the beach, the hillsides. The wind blows them about and when the rain comes, they get washed down into the sea. Then when there's a storm, they get thrown up onto the rather beautiful (in a rocky sort of way) stretch of coastline north of Methoni.

So I have launched my own tiny personal coastline clean up campaign. Pathetic really, but it makes me feel slightly better. Every time we go for a swim I take a bag and pick up rubbish from under the castle wall.

Here is this morning's haul. Actually, Geoff reckons he can use the white thing as a paint tray...

Cats, cats, cats - and more cats

Here's a new phenomenon this trip - scavenger cats. Sit down for dinner in a Peloponnese taverna and within a few minutes you are joined by stray cats. Sometimes it's one or two - though there have been up to seven or eight around our table on occasions. Skinny and nervous, though not noticeably injured or battered, they are out to beg, steal or borrow food from your plate. 

It's not just in restaurants you see stray cats - they are everywhere. Kittens playing in abandoned buildings, adults sleeping in sunny corners. Every municipal rubbish bin has a moggy or two searching for dinner. 

Waiting to be taken out fishing, Alypa

At the wonderful ruined city of Mystra I met a soft-hearted Australian woman going around Greece giving money to officials at tourist sites to buy cat food for the inevitable strays. Yeh right, I thought.

Still, I suppose some of those Greek ticket sellers may just have done it - you sometimes see old Greek ladies hobbling around putting cat biscuits on random walls; other times you come across someone's dinner leftovers piled in the street for the strays.

It's kinda cute, although I can't help but think that a concentrated de-sexing programme might be good for everyone involved. Because the other thing very noticeable in this part of the world is the absence of birds. You don't see seagulls or pigeons; you hardly see sparrows, let alone anything more glamorous or colourful.

Waiting for a bird. Except the black and white cat, who's eating the last one that dared to land

I can't say for certain why, but I might hazard a guess it's a legacy of generations of hungry stray cats.

Gareth Morgan*, Greece needs you

*New Zealand economist, politician, and philanthropist, who argues we'll never get a predator-free NZ while cats are on the loose. His 2013 campaign "Cats to go" was, as you might imagine, extremely controversial. http://morganfoundation.org.nz/cats/

What's left of Greece's bird populations