11 Februari 2007

You think you have all planned like clockwork. Everything's packed, reservations okay, skybox bought and installed. All you have to do now is to drive 2500 km. But that shouldn't be a problem at all because you own a brandnew heavy duty pickup jeep that you especially boughtfor these kind of trips A real mean machine suited to race Paris-Dakar. Just in case you have it all checked out and told the mechanics over and over again that you're going to drive to Crete with it. So you have a brand new car thhat is completely checked. Now nothing can go wrong, won't it!?

Yes it will!! Murphy never sleeps. Last friday when I went to pick up my "fellow traveller" and I noticed that the clutch was slipping a bit. On the way back it got a little worse. At first we decide that we wouldn't tell Arianne en just risk it. But on Saturday I didnt't feel comfortable at all with the idea to drive through the Alps with a heavy loaded jeepwith a clutch that can give up any minute. After conferring with a few friends we decided to postpone our departure.

So tomorrow morning we'll drive to Luxembourg city and hope that theproblem can be fixed. Let's see how the Nissan service is!!

To soften the pain, Stuart sent us some pictures to enjoy. On arrival we can't stay in the house yet so we'll be living in a holiday home for two weeks.

Click here for pictures

February 8th. 2007

Coming Sunday it's D-day (departure day). My good friend René, the two dogs and myself will get into that car, start the engine and will disappear behind the horizon while Thin Lizzy's 'Southbound' is bursting out of the speakers. A few days later Arianne will take the plane to Athens where we will pick her up for the last part of our journey.

It has been a while since we wrote in this diary. This was mainly for two reasons. We have been working like mad to get everything organised not only for the departure but to get the house ready to receive guests. Again we were helped by some dear friends whom we can't thank enough for doing that. Without them we would have been ready for departure somewhere around 2019.

The second reason is that we were waiting for some new pictures from Stuart to publish on this site. But unfortunately we haven't received any. Our theory is that Stuart is very sparse in sending us pix when he knows we will be coming soon. That way the surprise will be all the much bigger when we see the real thing. That's very sweet of him but to me it's nerve wrecking because I keep checking my mailbox every 5 minutes just in case he has sent some anyway. Maybe tomorrow on his usual update day he'll have a few.

Last week we had our farewell drinks with the Dutch section of our friends in our regular Maastricht hang out Cafe Thembi (check it out!). Before that we went into town to buy a book (Robin Lane Fox's "The Classical World', who said we aren't properly prepaired!?) and we saw how beautiful Maastricht is especially now with the renovated (!) market square and the marvellous bookstore they've started in the Dominican Church and the new classic (!) styled shopping centre. Just for a few seconds we had our doubts; what fool would leave these beautiful city for a hill in Luxembourg or another one on some far away island? Why not buy a nice mansion here? Well, I guess you have to be a "Mestreechteneer" to understand that where ever you will go, you'll automatically choose a place that's of extraordinary beauty because the city where you were born has set such a high standard.

In the evening we again had doubts seeing our friends. Why move 3000 km's away from such nice people? Luckily most of our friends are the traveling kind so we probably see them soon enough.

Hope to be able to write some more while we're still in Luxembourg. If not, bye for now!

January 25th. 2007

Our agent Stuart has returned from his well deserved holiday and he was so full of energy that immediately the grid on the island switched to overload. Therefore we had to wait 24 pain staking hours for the latest pix of the work that had been done while he was away. But it was worth the wait. You can click here to watch them or acces via the menu on the left.

Meanwhile we're still working our buts off to get our Luxembourg house ready for the guests. The mild winter is a blessing for us because there was lots of outside work to be done. A good friend of ours (right said Fred!!) came along to help us out and thanks to him we now have garages were you can actually park your car in! Our neighbour helped to clean and select our bookshelves (it's impossible for me to do that. It would be like if I had to choose between our two dogs; Sophie's Choice).

The balcony around the house is now completely closed with railings and safe for children who by the way can enjoy themselves on the swing we've built in the garden.

In the last entry we've announced a date for departure but we have to wthdraw this announcement already because we're still not sure what would be the best date so you will have to take a raincheck on that one. We have to be out of the house by the 17th of February because that's when the first Luxembourg guests will arrive. But still lots and lots to be done and still no logo yet!!!

We've also announced the special opening offer. This will be published next week. In the meantime you can enjoy looking at the pix.

January 10th. 2007

Lots of major and minor things have to be taken care off before we will be able to close the door here in Luxembourg. The dogs have to get their rabies shots if we want to get them in to Greece. This has to be done just in time; not too early and not too late and a minimum of two weeks before departure. The Nissan Navarra is ready for take off and equipped with special filters to endure the heat and the pollen filled air, the other little Nissan has to be temporarily cancelled from insurance and registry, We have to organize all insurances, see the dentist, get subscriptions, disconnect the phone, store personal stuff in the attic.

And, because we want to rent out our Luxembourg house we have to copy keys, do a lot of painting, clean out cupboards, redo the bannisters on the balconies, instruct the house supervisor, make an info brochure for the guests etc. etc. etc..Although this is a small country, everything is at least at 20 minutes driving. Doing a small chore can take a lot of time if you need something from the hardware store. We had to take the jeep to Luxembourg-City for maintenance and that is an hours drive. To bring it ánd get it back you'll have to drive 4 hours..

D-day is getting close especially when you realize that we won't be seeing our friends and relatives for a while. With Xmas I said goodbye to my mother whom we will see not earlier than May. A few days later our very good friend Carminda said goodbye. When Raymond and Rene leave for Crete, I'll be left alone for a couple of days without husband and dogs. These last two days will feel very strange to be left alone and to having to get away on my own.

We're about to set a final date for departure om order to book boat and airplane tickets. It's still unclear if we can stay at the house when we arrive. Stuart cannot guarantee anything because Minas and his Miraclemen are depending on the weather situation. Dispite of this we are keeping up good hopes. Besides, who or what is going to stop us occupying our property. We're not going to stay in some crummy hotel with two large dogs while we have 4 houses in throwing distance!

January 5th. 2007

The countdown has begun! In four (or five) weeks we'll be heading for Crete. Due to her hernia, Arianne will not be able to do the journey by car. Our very good friend René (listen very carefully, I will say this only once!) will accompany me and our two dogs Donna and Ligo in the car. He'll stay for a week or so to help us unpack and get started with the one million odd jobs we'll have to do. Arianne will fly to Athens were she will join us for the last bit to Crete

Now that we are suddenly just a few weeks away from our move 3000 km down south, I'd have to admit that I begin to feel the jitters. New year and Xmas (infamous as a main cause for depression) are milestones and make you look back and ahead. And this reminiscing had the result that I started asking myself: What the hell have we done!? We're living in a wonderful house in a wonderful country surrounded by nice people without a worry in the world and now we're going to an island in the middle of the mediterranean while the polar caps are melting!

Not only do we have a risk of getting wet feet, the carefully renovated farm could be wiped of the earth because it stands in the middle of an active earthquake area. And if natural disasters won't kill us we have a severe risk of getting the homesick blues, sun allergy, being run over by passing goats, or shot in a hunting accident!

Then there are the economical risks. Global warming keeps all the tourists home because it's warmer in the north of Europe than in Greece. Oil prices could rise to a level that nobody can afford to fly anymore or security measures are such that you can only fly in an airplane when you strip naked and ware shackles.

Just before we bought the site in Kounopitsa, I wrote down a doomsday scenario in my report to Arianne. It was something like this

"On a hot and steamy day we're sitting on the courtyard in front of a house that is in desperate need of some paint. Plaster has come off but nobody seems to care.
Donna, our labrador died of heat exhaustion a few months after we arrived. The soil was too hard to bury her in so we had to leave her on one of the numerous dumps they have here alongside the roads.
Ligo, the surviving dog is tied to an iron chain. Covered with flees she barks all day and will bite everyone (including us) that dares to come close.

We're just sitting there in silent hate of eachother when somebody with a rucksack stops in front. We don't even bother to get up and welcome this potential client. Which might as well be because he's only asking if we could lend him some change for a bus fare (we can't and if we could, we wouldn't). A loud crack announces that the sheep have broke the fence again and makes way for them to eat the last dried out shrubberies, the only thing that's left of what once was a lush garden.........."

Anyway, enough of that gloomy stuff. Let's rejoyce in the hope of a bright future for all of us and have a look at the latest pictures Stuart send us. We are going to install a webcamera on our site so you can keep track of us while we "suffer" on Crete. This is what you will see:

(click on picture to see more)

December 13th. 2006

Arianne is fortunately doing a bit better (thanks everyone for your wishes!). She's able to do some things again and just in time because last week the movers came a week earlier as planned while we had to clear our living room completely because the wooden floor had to be redoner. Lots of fun and surprises..

But as always things aren't that bad as they seem. All of our stuff was packed and ready way before the movers arrived and our stay in one of the bedrooms was quite cozy and brought back good memories of our days as a student. A good exercise for our first weeks on Crete. Work will not have completely finished when we arrive and we will have to from one room to another several times.

Anyway, down under things are going reasonabely well (although some experts say it's a downright miracle that we have finished this much so far. Just a few hick ups:

• Although all tiles were already ordered in May and everything was checked over and over again it proved that we were still 114 m2 short. The order has to be shipped and tiling will not be finished this year.

• We were very proud of our fine, new wooden floor. The plumber however was less impressed and demolished a few m2 to fit his pipes in. Stuart was "not amused". Big thumbs up for the plumber however he admitted his mistake and proised to pay the damages.

• Stable bathroom: A returning annoyance. Here too everything was checked and doublechecked again when suddenly asked if the bathroomdoors would open because the chestnut beams were in the way. The most obvious often stays unnoticed, everyone including us missed it. The door couldn't open inwards so it had to be reversed but this had implications for the windows and they had to be changed too..

All of which minor problems because no blockades and builder strikes and other disasters occurred.

Only ten days left till Xmas and than work will be virtually closed for two or three weeks. In the meantime we hope to receive more pictures of this kind.

November 27th. 2006

Unfortunately some bad news from the homefront. Arianne had been suffering from back pain for several weeks and last week it suddenly snapped. She woke up in the middle of the night and was barely able to walk because of the pain that shot into her right leg. Our GP conluded that she had Ischias (a kind of hernia) and gave her some pills and a week of bed rest. But after a week she wasn't better and we were sent to a specialist. After spending the whole day in the hospital we knew that it was a severe hernia and that she should avoid any heavy work from now on.

This is not the best news if you're doing a renovation and if you have to move house 3000 km away when you're finished after that (and will have to stick to deadlines). On the up side: the doctor said that it would be best to keep warm (preferably move to warmer climate!!) and swimming is a very good therapy. What a good thing that Stuart mailed us the first pictures of the construction of the swimming pool (click to view the album)!

We don't exactly know how we're going to cope with this new situation yet. First priority is to get Arianne back on her feet again and, as always: wait and see and come up with plan B!

November 20th. 2006

We have found a marvelous program to create web photo albums (thanks Marcel and Chantal in Rethumnon) and we'll be able to show you more and better pictures.

Click on the the images below to view the new albums.

October/November 2006

Pictures of the Kastelli-Kissamos area

November 17th. 2006

At last; they've begun to dig the pool! It's written down so easily but it took a lot of effort to be able to write this. Ofcourse there was usual drama with getting the permits and the weather wasn't helping either but finally the last of the big works has started!

The construction of the pool wil take about a month and it will be a tight race because it has to be ready before Christmas. Between Christmas and mid-January nothing happens in Greece and by the beginning we will take possession of our property.

We have reached a huge progress. Ofcourse I could write long and boring stories but action speaks louder than words. Click on Minas to get things going:

Do the Minas!!!

November14th. 2006

It's getting more real.

Transport to Crete is organised. Next week we will get our moving boxes and we can start packing. On the 11th of December our things will be sent ahead to Crete. Down there everything is going fine. A wooden floor has been fitted in the stable and today the digging on the pool is supposed to start and within a week they will start tiling.

We can hardly wait to see it in the flesh but, as allways we will have to be patient.......

7 november 2006

The storm from a few weeks ago had a little aftermath......

They discovered some substantial damp spots and Stuart and Minas had to find out both the cause and the solution for the problem. The digging of the pool had to be postponed because there was a big risk to ge the big diggers in. On an architect's and an ingineer's advise they dug out a trench of about 3M deep. This was difficult because they had to do this very carefully in order to avoid the newly build steps to collapse. If they would hit solid rock the whole operation would take a lot of a etra time (which we don't have).

It all went well we're happy to say. The day before last we got the pictures which showed accurately how they did it. A lot of plastic, insulation material and 30 (!) cubic metres of pebblestones were brought in the hole carefully to avoid damages.

Meanwhile plastering in the stable had to be delayed as long as we had the damp problem. House, appartment and studio were already plastered.and are already looking great. It al finally is taking shape. The former owner came over to have a look and regretted he'd ever sold the property. How's that for a compliment!

So, again some delays but luckily the problem is solved. The storm was a blessing in disguise because without it we wouldn't even have noticed the problem in the first place and we won't see the plasteringcoming down after everything has been finished.

The weather is supposed to improve in the next few days and the digging of the pool can start..

On our last visit in September I've met a British lady who knows a lot of mediterranean gardens. She has made a gardening plan for us. As long as we have the diggers on the property we can make use of them for planting trees. This is the right season for planting anyway. And the good thing is that they will be standing there when we arrive in February.

RIDERS ON THE STORM

As you may all have read or seen on television, we had quite an autumn storm on Crete. Especially the region between Chania and Almerida had some severe problems.
Kastelli had little to no problems except that it wasn't reachable by the main road for a day (which virtually means that it got cut off).

Our old farm got through the storm well. That's the advantage of having an old house: it has past all the real life tests and knows what to do when there's trouble. We had a little problem in the stable caused by all the massive excavations that have been done. But the problem was minor and has already been solved.

For some beautiful lightning pictures and live footage of a backyard torrent click http://www.chamar-kreta.nl/ .

In the meantime we had some other kind of storm. As we're slowly reaching the final phases of the renovation we are getting a more precise insight in what this all is going to cost. And ofcourse this is, as renovations projcts go, a bummer! When doing a project like this you'll encounter some setbacks as you go. And we had quite a few: we were stalked by sheep, harrassed by furniture, fenced off and blocked in to name some.

It is impossible to judge the state of a house/ruin just by looking at it. The real situation is only revealed when you start the work and look closer. That is why we had to say goodbye to the beautful breadoven (fournos), it was in too bad shape and would have probably cost a small fortune to repair it.

Another difficulty is that it is very hard to envisage a picture of what the end result should be on the day you start. As you see the project evolving you are likely to change your mind.

A year ago we wanted everything to be very simple, nothing fancy because the farm was a gem in itself. But as the work progressed, we saw that it was criminal to do a very basic renovation using cheap materials and we had to change course. This ofcourse has it's financial consequences.

So when we saw the estimates last week..... . Well I can just say that we were blown away and washed from our feet even though we were 3000 km away from the actual storm! We will have to make some arrangements and hope that we won't live till a hundred because our plundered pension plan will not allow us to.

But anyway it is going to be a beauty: Here are some new pictures:

NEW STABLEFLOOR UNDER CONSTRUCTION

PHOTO ALBUM

NEW COURTYARD WALLS

STUART'S LATESTS (FRIDAY 13th)

Here are a few pictures Stuart sent us last weekend. Everything seems to be sliding into its final form. Plastering has started and the heavy structural work are coming to a close. Next phase will be the construction of the second floor in the stable and, when it stops raining, the construction of the swimming pool.

Enscherange (October 10th)

The sun is shining brightly here in Luxembourg. On Crete it's raining cats and dogs. Seems the nice weather is following us across Europe. We hope the weather situation will improve on Crete otherwise the construction of our pool will be in jeopardy. The dusty soil turns into a mudpool maiking it impossible for the JCB's to manoeuvre. We'll just have to wait and see.

Meanwhile Minas and his Miraclemen are working like crazy to get everything ready before December. Last week Stuart called us from the side and said that he counted 27 men working on the plot. Stuart is calculating and accounting as fast as he can but has difficulties keeping up with the speed of the builders; he's calculating costs for the next phase and than Minas reports that the projected work is already finished.

Our two weeks on Crete have, as always, been very exhausting and refreshing at the same time. We met Minas and his men ofcourse. Minas (from Asiminas is Greek for silver) is worth his weight in gold (hope he doesn't read this; it will get very expensive) and his workers are a very goodmooded bunch that keep constantly checking if we like what they are doing. And in return we ask if they like the houses and occasionally bring along a cold brew.

Minas is building four other houses some 200m downhill and lives in Kissamos which ensures that he's on site every day. He's a very gentle man and he maintains a cool head amidst all the turmoil and constantly ringing cellphones. His grandfather has built the little church we look on to (picture) and he knows a lot of the history of Kounopitsa and Kissamos. He promised to tell us all about it by the time our Greek is good enough to understand him.

Our Greek by the way is improving rapidly thanks to hanging around the building site and going shopping. Construction workers and furniture salesmen do not often see tourists and their English is rudimentary or non existant. And I'm proud to say that I managed to say the following sentence: "Otan ie doelia ine etimos, kane ena megalo jorti mazi" , which propably in English would be: "If work ready we make party together". Not very eloquent but judging the big smile I received, a point well taken.

In the last week we saw ourselves for the huge task of choosing four kitchens and doors and windows for all the house in just four days. Nobody in his right mind would ever do this. Usually one buys a kitchen after carefull deliberations and comparing countless offers and models. Not us! Four days and you'll have to know what you want or otherwise pick something off the internet. One of the consequences you have to deal with if you decide to do a renovation 3000 km's from home. The upside ofcourse is that it spares you the agony of boring visits to showrooms and endless discussions on colouration .

Luckily we succeeded in this short timespan and now we are trying (with Stuart nearly going insane because he has to fit it in to measures which aren't known yet) to get it organized.

Almost all the choices for major items have been made. Only the pool terrace and the steel bannisters are left to be decided.

As our final departure for Crete is getting nearer, we have to get ready for the big move and preparing our house in Luxembourg for renting as a holiday home in 2007. It's a nice house on a beautiful location and we will miss it intensely here. We're leaving behind a house that was build with the hands of Arianne's father and brother under supervision of Aad (Arianne's mother). Work that was continued by us and some good friends (with René ofcourse being the head Egyptian). It is not a farewell but just a goodbye so no need to gloom but leaving this unsaid would make this diary incomplete.

For those of you who haven't seen it yet and to those who'd like to spend a vacation in this gem of a country called Luxembourg, here are some pictures I took yesterday:

road up to the house

view from the balcony

the plot

Crete (September 23th)

Back on Crete once again. This week it has been a year ago that I travelled to this proud island for an "orientation". At that time with fairly vague plans and certainly not with an outset to come home with a registred deed. Things went a bit different back then and they still do.

We'll have to face it: there is no such thing as planning over here. Today is today and tomorrow..... Well that's another day. It was just two weeks ago that we were down on our knees and hanging on in quiet desperation. After this things changed for the better culminating in our first visit to our property last monday when we speechlessly admired the huge transformation that had taken place. We were immediately taken away by the enthousiasm of Minas the Miracleman, our new builder. And now we are a bit grumpy again because nothing much seemed to have happened the last one and a half(!) day (well okay, there wás a plumber fumbling about).

People are funny sometimes. We have patiently been looking for months at, well at virtually nothing really. Progress was like looking at water turning into ice. And now, now there is an explosion of activity we're already "not satisfied" when a lonely plumber is doing the very necessary work of hacking trenches.

But then again these first few days were incredible. You had just but to turn your head an a new wall, arch, concrete column had risen. Rocks the size of Gibraltar were dug out the ground and walls of Jericho crumbled. These boys were working as if the devil was their foreman. Fast and with great craftsmanship they erected perfect perpendicular walls. This ofcourse without safety helmets and without an EU inspector on site who was clocking the time they were working in full sunlight.

Stonehenge, the Pyramids? All build by Greeks (with some help from lots of Albanians). It may take some time before they get going but if they are on a steam you'd better get out of the way.

Construction seems to be going smoothly. Now we have to keep an eye on the big picture. With Minas now having taken construction in hand we have entered a legal nomansland. We were much too pleased with him helping us out to discuss legal technicalities (which was also very hard to do sitting behind a computer screen in Luxembourg). Now that we áre here we have to give our cooperation some kind of formal status.

Not that a contract offers any guarantee. Our experience here has shown that contracts in Greece have a mere indiative function. They only prove that contracting parties know eachother vaguely and have at one time had a nice chat about construction and stuff and that, given the right circumstances one might be doing something like that at some point in the future (ofcourse everything no strings attached!)

And than there are over a zillion other things that should be taken care of. Anyway; the joy has returned. Unfortunately the impatience never left.

Pictures September 15th 2006

September 12th, 2006.

All this time that construction was delayed over and over again it seemed a bit of an unreal situation. Now we finally realise that it's all real and that we have to open up beginning of spring. Help! We have so many things to organize and to do before we are really ready.

Our departure is also becoming more realn through all the things we're doing here in Luembourg for the last time. For example; Raymond is sitting on his lawnmower happy as a pig in the mud when he suddenly realises that this will be one of the last times he an do this. I'm busy doing painting on the outside and also this chore will be the last time left to do for a long time.I'm even painting windowframes which are normally due just in a few years. We're cleaning up garages and throwing things away that we haven't used for years. Someone else would do the same but for us saying goodbye to this old stuff is a final one.

In the house itself it's the same thing but even more difficult. We plan to bring as little as possible but still teher are mani items we can't seem to do without

Coming monday we're finally departing for Crete after 3,5 months since last Tihis time we'll be staying for 2 weeks. We're really looking forward to it. Again we won't have much time to relax. First of all we'll meet our new builder: Minas the Miracleman with whom we'll have to discuss over a 1000 or so details and progress. In October the rains will start so I get to select all kinds of plants, trees and bushes and find a place for them so they will have time to cath root before we do.

Then we have to shop for kitchens and do some research on the decoration of the appartments and houses. The remaining time will be filled with many, many other appointments. Hopefully there will be some time left for having some vacation. The evenings will be reserved for long meals in our favourite taverna's and the see is always nearby...........

The stripped mulberry in the courtyard

And the first walls:

But then there was progress

Enough nagging about delays, cables, obstructions, fences, sheep, sheperds, furniture and what have you. Let's just have fun and look at some pictures:

The new entrance and the driveway:

The front:

The stable with windows:

A sidewindow

A stable with daylight!

From the top:

Bricks ready to be layed and...............................................................................evrything straightened out

Blocked Again

Lots of things have been happening to us lately. At first we had the problem with the electricity cables which made it impossible to pour the concrete for the new appartment roof and also hindered delivery of various building materials. I won't even mention all the other minor and major problems we also encountered and which were very hard to solve now everybody took a vacation.

All this was just too much for our builder. After someone blocked the builders entrance road and made it impossible again to deliver materials he said: "Right! That's it! I'm off!" And who could blame him! Luckily our agent managed to find a new builder very quickly and this one started off with great vigour and enthousiasm ánd a solution for our appartment roof. And so everything seemed to turn out for the best.

But, you may have guessed it, it didn't. Some very impatient JCB driver deliberately blocked the builders acces road claiming that we owe him money and that he wouldn't move untill we meet his demands. In the meanwhile, our sheperd, observing that activity had stopped, invited his flock in to our property to feast on whatever there is to be found (which isn't much I assure you). So THEY were back! This ofcourse without asking permission or at least let us know that he planned to do a Von Runstedt offensive on us.

An again our agent was the one tackling this problem driving the flock back behind their Maginot line bravely defending our intrests. If you think the sheperd would apologize for this maverick action, you are wrong! He called our agent adding some very peculiar words to his vocabulary as if it were us that trespassed on his property.

Does this all make us doubtfull of our plans? Quite the contrary ! We did however make a small change of plans and that is that next to the tourism business we are going to start a shelter for wolves, hyena's, coyote's and several other kanines that were mistreated and hold a very big grudge to anyone holding a stick. Just to give us something to do during winter and as a bit of a moonlighting job.

In the meantime we are going to stop being mr. and mrs. Nice Guy. How this is going to continue? Well, keep clicking this site!

Holidays

And now August has arrived and everyone in Greece is taking a leave. So do our builders; they wanted to continue but several materials didn't arrive on time and are not likely to arrive in the coming 2 weeks. Fortunately all other things have gone well the last few days so we have made quite some progress. We even have our first new concrete floor:

On our favourite north side they have cleaned up the site and removed some trees that were blocking the view (don't worry we still have plenty of trees left and will plant new ones). Now we can see the contours of what will be the "public" terrace for our guests. Ofcourse every guest will have their own terrace (also with sea,- and mountainviews) but we also wanted to create a terrace were people can meet eachother, have barbecues or just enjoy the lights of Kissamos and the ships and fishingboats at night. This terrace will have the best panoramic view on the bay of Kissamos and Kissamos itselve and is ofcourse also very suited to organize parties.

This terrace area is the border of our site on the north. On the southern limit we will have the swimming pool and bar area. In the middle and well isolated from these "public" areas we'll have the guest accomodations. That means to ensure everybody's privacy but that amenities are never far away.

That was also the main reason that we've bought this property; It's situated outside the town and therefor not bothered by traffic noise and music coming from bars and taverna's, a quiet place (except when the owner is playing his bass) to relax. But if you want to go out and meet people, choose from a variety of taverna's, bars, beach cafe's or do some shopping, you are just minutes away.

By sitting on this terrace you can even check out in advance if the beach is not too crowded and if the shops are opened yet. If you're waiting for the ferry you can look out for it's arrival and still be on time to board. (Oh God, I wish they had already finished and I could be writing this on that very same terrace!!!)

They told us the most important thing when doing a project like this is to be patient. We never could imagine that this being patient would be the hardest part of it all.

Anyway, still working on the renewal of the site but keep tracking us because you'll never know what happens next. We plan to fly over to Crete in september were we will celebrate the first year anniversary of our Cretan Adventure. We hope that this time around we will be able to have a bit of a holiday and relax a bit. We've had a very busy summer and still have to do some renovations here in Luxembourg to be able to rent it out in the next year.

Confused?

Yes, I guess you are. You might even think we're panicking. Hell no!!!!! Everything is going as planned. We knew from the start this wasn't going to be a walk in the park. Greece legislation is unfortunately not up to modern standards.

Greek land registry law has been introduced in 1995 (before that it was the law of Oracles) and land registration should be finished by 2010. At the moment there are no clear charts of the country and who owns exactly what. In fact the island of Crete is three times bigger on paper than it's actual size!! One shouldn't be surprised if ownership claims collide.
Even specialists can't give inside in this common law. People who want to have certainty and guarantees shouldn't involve themselves in projects like this.

Don't think the Greeks are happy with this situation. They are as confused as we are and go to court whenever they can because that's the only way to get at least some certainty about their position.

And for those of you who think we in western europe have our things well organized I'll refer to:

• The seat of the European Parliament
• subsidies for so called "empoverished regions" near Amsterdam, Milan and London
• allmost every public construction project
• (conflicting) overregulation on even the tiniest aspects of our life (see: Publication Bulletin of the European Committee)
• George Bush (we are supposed to be friends)