Aghia Marina - Mad Bikers of Leros

The Greeks have a saying, "Go to Leros!!" It means you're nuts and are going to be locked up.

Leros has a checkered past. But it is full of surprises for the enterprising traveller and has beautiful harbours and coves. There's also a castle perched on a hill surrounded by sea on two sides. Spectacular stuff, especially when the moon's behind it and you're tucking into prawns, washed down by a nice bottle of levkos (white)!

Crithoni is about halfway between Aghia Marina and Alinda and if you’re heading back to Aghia Marina the local kids follow you everywhere. They throw up a hand shouting to offer you a lift. The only problem is .......it's by bike.......and they're bombing everywhere on the things. The first day there were just one or two bikes. The next day there about ten to fifteen! The younger kids would be on bicycles. It didn’t seem to matter. Whenever we walked down to town in the evening we had this crazy escort. It’s a good job that road had very little traffic! As the kids recognised us (we must have appeared like space-zombies or something to them) more would follow us as we walked along the promenade toward the marina. One shouted, “I’m Mike!” Mike couldn't wait to get me on his bike.

Golden rule no.1

Never get on a bike in Greece!

Mike kept nagging. Then, one evening, to my partner’s horror, I relented and got on so he could give me a lift down to the marina. It was only a few hundred yards! (Actually, it was great fun).

Only on one other occasion have I let this rule slip and that was in 77 when, after wandering around Sounion for a knackering four hours in the heat (while searching for the silver mine of Lavrion) I gratefully accepted a lift to the bus-stop from a guy who appeared out of nowhere.

Every time I popped out of our hotel the bikers would appear, revving the guts out of their lawn-mower engines, as if they were Harleys.

The Turkish Problem

Most of the other action here happens in the hills above Alinda and consists of the Greek military keeping an eager eye on the Turkish coast. There were no jet-skis there in Alinda when we visited in the early 90s.