The daily routine of the last two months has been bothering me lately… I was desperately looking for a way to escape and the public holidays at the end of October offered an excellent opportunity to leave everything behind and charge my batteries.
After the suggestion of some good friends I decided to head to the mountains of western Greece and more specifically to the village of Syrrako at an altitude of approximately 1150m. According to Google maps, the village is 4 hours away by car. The weather forecast was excellent for such an escape (no rain, nor snow or ice and a temperature between 6 and 12 degrees )
We set off at 09:35 in the morning and due to our kid complaining in his child seat, we had to make a pause after approximately 2 or 2:30 hours. At this amount of time the best option is to have a driving break at another traditional (but also more touristic) village called Metsovo. The sensation of escaping from routine was such that I wanted to drive relaxed with a speed of 120-130km/h. Only when at some point the kid started complaining I had to go faster 150-160 km/h on the Adaptive Cruise Control. So, after 238km and 3 toll stations away, we arrived in Metsovo.
We were lucky as the village was not occupied by tourists and we enjoyed the nice weather, we enjoyed the brown tree leaves
and also a relaxed walk around the central square
Knowing that we were in the middle of our trip and that the most difficult part was ahead we stayed only for 50 minutes and then we left for Syrrako. In the second part of our trip we used only for a while the highway, then some country roads and then we started ascending to Syrrako with the 2nd gear in the gear box and a speed of approximately 35km/h. That is for 85km we traveled for 2:30 hours. Then we headed to our hotel (which fully deserves the 9.5 rating in Booking) ate and relaxed
Syrrako is located at the edge of a gorge and at the opposite side there is similar village called Kalarrytes. Although the horizontal distance between them is about 1km, in order to go by car you have to travel for 1 hour or more. So, the next day we decided to visit it.
In the between the two villages there is a well known (but nowadays abandoned) monastery built in the year 1212: the Kipina monastery (see more here and here)
The location where the monastery is built is amazing the atmosphere is full of mysticism and nostalgia
After arriving at our destination (again only 2nd gear in the gear box and speed around 30-35km/h) we followed the usual method of relaxing (sit and drink coffee, walk around without purpose and sit down to eat) and returned back to the hotel.
The 3rd day was a rainy one so nothing special to report, so we skip it and go th=o the report of the 4th day (the day of returning back to home).
On the 4ht day we followed the same plan: split the trip to Metsovo but…we used a different road…the Baros pass is quite known to bikers and used to be dangerous. Due to some road works in 2013 it is now just a beautiful road in high altitude (around 1905m)
To me it was maybe the most beautiful 3 hours of driving and at some parts it reminded me of Transfăgărășan
The environment was offering even more beautiful pictures but I took no more…We had to arrive home…
So the trip ended. After returning home I did some calculations about our trip:
677 kilometers in total
5.4 liters/100km average consumption
61 km/h average speed and
150 km of fuel still in the reservoir
Not much else to say.
After 4 days, I still have images in my mind and I still go to work with a smile on my face
Best regards to all
Comments 1
so beautiful