A Late Afternoon Excursion and Sunset

The singers spent Thursday morning in Opera Gala rehearsals. Then in the mid afternoon Jeshua organized a VOT field trip to Galissas, another beach town across the island, to watch the sunset. 

We set off, once again, on the local bus route. Once there, Jeshua and VOT went hiking up to the hilly point overlooking the cove of the beach to the little Catholic chapel, Agia Pakou, from which they could also see the cove to the south, Armeos. Of course they sang in the chapel!

You hike up around from the back.

Archeologists say that Galissas has been inhabited since the 6th century BC. Near where the chapel is, they have found signs of a temple to Apollo and a small cemetery.

Homes along the hillside...notice the flat roofs...most buildings have flat roofs.

Having decided that hiking was beyond me, I settled for browsing in a couple of little shops and scoping out where I might eat dinner. I ended up having a nice conversation with one of the shop keepers...and at the end, she offered me a piece of the island's famous lukumi from her private stash. Lukumi is a Greek version of Turkish Delight, which is a gel of water, sugar and flavors that is then cut into small squares and rolled in powdered sugar to serve. I chose a red one...which turned out to be rose water flavored and then she insisted I try the green one, lime, her personal favorite. Quite yummy.

And, of course, a kitty or two on a cafe wall.

I then went on to the beach where I would meet the group for a swim.The shallow sand beach area went out, got a little deeper and then you rose up on a sand bar to ankle deep again before getting to swimming levels. A perfect spot of the little ones to play in the water.

An umbrella for shade. I had to move my chair around as the sun sunk lower in the horizon.

And gradually the day gave way...

Jeshua and I went up to a cafe for dinner that had a small Thai menu--which sounded wonderful to me!!

Nice cold water and coke, but, alas, no ice.😞

Jeshua had a very yummy pasta...

For appetizers, we had Chicken Wings with my beloved sweet chili sauce and "Grilled" Cheese--meaning melted cheese for scooping. I had chicken with garlic and cashews. Very yummy! I ate every bite!

The day faded into twilight and into night.

We caught the 9 p.m. bus back to Hermopolis, which went the long way around, so we got to see several smaller towns and approach the city from the south.

Of course, we had to walk from one end of the harbor around to the other to get from the bus station to our hotel, but gelato helped us with the journey!