<<< rainy days in greece >>>

after a sunny weekend in plovdiv and some more beautiful days in sofia, we left on early friday morning to take the train to thessaloniki. and...who would have guessed, it was raining. three days straight. of course, exactly the three days that we spent in greece. well, at least it was also raining in sofia, so it was still an improvement.
an improvement??? hmm....okay, yeah, thessaloniki is a lot prettier than sofia: it has a nice center, a long quayside along the agean sea and lots and lots of old (byzanthine) ruins, which seem all to be situated about one and a half meters underneath today's ground.

however, the rain in thessaloniki is just the same horrible wet balkan rain that forces even me - who doesn't like any equipment agains rain very much - to buy an umbrella. and the traffic is even worse than in bulgaria's capital. on our way back to sofia i overheard a bulgarian girl describing the differences of both cities: in sofia, you are stuck in traffic all day, but during the night, you can freely go whereevery you like. yet in thessaloniki, traffic at night is just as bad during the day....it IS CRAZY!!!
from the train window, i already saw the big yellow fields of blooming rape all over the north of greece. wonderful! that early in the year....i really love it when spring paints the nature around us taking away this greyish veil of winter (sounds cheesy, i know, but it is true, though :-P)


oh, yes, darling! i think you made it: you are a bit taller than the palm tree :D

hmmm...so what did we do all day? we arrived in thessaloniki after a 7-hour ride in the train and the bus. (i had a first peak at the southern bulgarian country side and i kinda decided that i have to take a trip there, too, soon!) around 2 pm, we were welcomed by matina, our couchsurfing host - a crazy 18-year-old red head. she only let us into her flat and left again, leaving us behind with the advice to sleep and gain some energy for the party at night...well, we didn't rest (and later didn't go to the party) but went into the center instead walking all day along the quayside and from one café to the next...after all, it is not very nice to stay in the open for very long, when it is raining, raining, raining....
oh yeah! the return-ticket to thessaloniki was less than 40 euros for both of us, but the coffee in thessaloniki is so expensive that the trip cost a bit more than i had expected...between 3 and 4 euros for a regular cappucini!!! this really is exaggerated even considering that one always receives a glass of water and usually a few cookies to accompany the coffee!

so, having spent the first day in greece walking around, having coffee and doing some window shopping, we went back to matina's flat in the evening together with three other german girls, whom we had met in the city and who were surfing matina's couch at the same time. we slept almost 12 hours and continued on saturday and sunday just the same as we had finished friday....

my darling also had her first couchsurfing experience...it appears that it wasn't as bad as she might have expected *hihi*
altogether, it was a nice weekend after all...

PS: WUSCHELFILZBALL, ICH LIEBE DICH!!!!! freu mich auf bald bei dir ;)