Been too long.....

Yes, it's been a few weeks since I gave an update of what's happening here in Corfu. The tourists are here now, enjoying the sun and the beaches. The mix has changed considerably in the last couple of years, most visible tourists in our area now coming from Russia and Eastern European countries reflecting the rise in their fortunes and the decline in the traditional British and Italian fortunes!

They're all welcome as Corfu needs every tourist Euro it can get. A rising and worrying trend is the All-Inclusive holiday where people pay for hotel, food and drinks in advance and as long as they stay in their hotels around the pool, they can eat and drink themselves senseless on terrible food and the cheapest hooch. The local tavernas and bars see little or none of their business as these "tourists" come with almost empty pockets.

BUT, many of the Eastern Europeans seem to be giving their trade to the local businesses, the restaurants and car rental companies advertise their menus and price lists in Russian, Serbian, Polish and a few other languages in addition to the more traditional English and Italian.

The ferries are still running, the planes arriving and the buses taking them all to their hotels pass us in droves at times, so it can't all be bad in this economic climate.....

It's July and HOT

Lat week we went down to the huge sandy beach at the lagoon, Limni Konsia, which is on the south-west coast of Corfu. Here you are looking out onto the Ionian Sea and if you crane your neck, you'll be looking directly up towards Venice! The sun was hot, but the water too cold for swimming. Perhaps that's because we went in the early morning to avoid other people, but even then, I don't believe there would have been many people later in the day. Spent an hour ot two beach combing for shells and strangely-shaped pebbles.

Tomorrow we drive to southern tip of the island - the starting point of my bottom-to top walking route - next year!

July is here...

The 4th of July and my birthday treat is dinner in the rooftop garden of the Cavalieri Hotel in Corfu Town. We've been looking forward to doing this for a long time. It is positively summer now, over 30C every day and just lovely. Last week Barbara attended a 5 day course in mosaics run by two English ladies and taught by two maestros from Ravenna in italy. I would like to have done it myself since my art is confined to my photographic attempts and this would be a nice variation, perhaps next year when they do another course! Barbara created a very good copy of an ancient mosaic of a fish - well, I think so...

Here's her fish...

Getting HOT

As we progress into the summer it's getting hotter by the day and the sea, just across the road, beckons. It's now firmly in the 30's C every day and our routine will definitely change. Last July and August we spent every afternoon in the Corfiot form of a siesta - dead to the world after lunch - even with the air-conditioning on! So this summer shouldn't be much different except that we now have a beach immediately opposite our home. (See the link to the "Sandy Beach Studio for some photographs)

A quick swallow....

Yesterday we went to the Kanoni Peninsula which is the part of Corfu where the very earliest settlements were established some 5,000 years ago. They abandoned these settlements as the port they were using was silting up - even then. It is now a lagoon and hosts the Corfu Airport amongst other things. Get to the point, Rob - there were a few swallows doing figure-of-eight circuits, swooping and swirling around getting their afternoon snack of flying insects. Here's one of them - remarkably lucky shot to be in focus at all.

Piano Concert

Last night we were delighted by a student playing what we believe to be a concert as part of her final examinations from the Ionian University Music Department. She played 4 pieces by Mozart, Brahms, Ravel and Prokofiev. She played to an audience of fellow students, her teachers, family and us.

It was an honour to be allowed to listen to her play. Magnificent!

When we lived in China and Hong Kong we often went to concerts by internationally-renowned players, especially in Hong Kong where we had the opportunity to attend many concerts in their International Arts festival. She played as well as any of them, even better in some cases.

Her name was Dimitra Kokkinopoulou - watch out for that name!!!

Hotting up

Now the temperature is hitting 30C at least every day, so summer is definitely upon us. We've refurbished our separate studio in the hopes that some visitors might just want to rent it for a few weeks through the summer months.

We've had a family of nestlings and parents in our eaves for the last month and I see now that they've all gone. I'm amazed at how quickly it went from building the next to the chicks hatching, growing and flying away - 4 or 5 weeks at the most.

Here's 2a photographs taken an hour before they all left home!