Epiphany

Still house-sitting on 6th January, I arrived in Preveza to find a procession made up of a brass band, Greek Orthodox priests, altar boys and church dignitaries making its way along the shopping street. I later found out this was the procession of the Greek Festival of Epiphany, or 'The Blessing of the Waters' which is held every year on January 6 throughout all of Greece. I also discovered that I had missed the most interesting part of this special occasion which is when young Greek men brave the chilly waters to dive for a cross after it has been blessed by a priest and thrown into the water. The first man who recovers the cross is said to have good luck throughout the coming year. I have made a note to watch this part of the Festival next year.
My house-sitting duties have now finished; the dog and cats were happy to be back in the tender loving care of their owner and I was happy to move back to my apartment. We have had some torrential rain over the last couple of weeks and temperatures in the low teens although we got up to 16 degrees today. When the sun does shine there is a hint of spring in the air and there are wild dwarf iris growing in the hedgerows and Mombretia growing on walls in Preveza. Despite this hint of spring the woods have an autumnal look as the leaves on the deciduous trees only begin to change colour in December.
This is a quiet time of year when tavernas tend to close for a refurb or simply because there are no visitors to the area. The sales have just started so the shopping streets will be busy for the next few weeks and it is a good time to pick up a bargain.
The forecast is for dry weather over the next week so I’m hoping to spend some time at TheMoonGrove picking up the nets, pruning the olive trees and doing some maintenance on the land. I shall also be looking out for the wild narcissi which will be appearing between the trees very shortly. Watch out for the piccies, the flowers are so pretty and have a beautiful scent. At the moment there are lots of different fungi on TheGrove at the moment although we have yet to find any that are edible.
So here’s to a productive, rustic, next week and hopefully some more of that spring-like sunshine.

Καλή Χρόνια

Welcome to TheMoonGrove blog. I would like to tell you how this blog is going to take shape but to be honest I’m not really sure; let’s just say that I think of it as something organic which will, I hope, grow in interesting ways.
You should be able to get an idea of what TheMoonGrove is about from the other web pages so I guess this will be a more personal record of all things to do with TheMoonGrove that will take shape over time.
So let’s start with Καλή Χρόνια - Kali Kronia – A Happy New Year to you!
At the moment I am house and critter (a dog and two cats) sitting in a rural area a few kilometres outside Preveza. Last night we had spectacular thunderstorms throughout the night which resulted in no electricity when I woke up. As I need a caffeine fix first thing in the morning the dog and I made an early exit into Preveza for breakfast. One of the joys of driving in Greece is the lack of traffic on rural roads and, as is usually the case, our only holdup was to allow a large flock of sheep to move to their new pasture for the day.
In Preveza I was taken by surprise to find that most of the shops were still shut. Yesterday I knew about....... today who knows? I guess things will be back to normal tomorrow.

We have rain forecast for the next few days but temperatures in double figures which I still find a pleasant surprise after my many winters in the UK. People of many years residence here complain of the cold; I am still saying, 'What winter!', but I'm sure that will change with time.

So if this organic where will the blog go next? I'm hoping that it will make its way to my website link but ............... watch this space! - I will update at least once a week so here goes..............