Thursday 21st April 2022 – Lake Mornou

 

Happy Birthday Queen Elizabeth.
Time to move on after a lovely stay in Meteora. We are heading back to the Peloponnese for Greek Easter but wanted to investigate less travelled routes on the way. The satnav took us on the E65, which was obviously toll-free when the mapping that Garmin use was created. They do now charge tolls but it gave us a quicker route down to Lamia and therefore more time on the part of the journey that we were looking forward to.
South of Lamia, we left the motorway and headed south up into the mountains towards Amfissa. After approx. 18km we turned west onto a road that both of our ancient maps showed as a ‘green’ route i.e. picturesque, a description that was entirely accurate. A very quiet road took us through beautiful scenery enhanced by that snowfall of three days ago. Progress was slow as I kept stopping to admire the view and at one point, we started following signs to the Sanctuary of Herakles. Not marked on our maps but indicated by road signs from a long distance away, it was obviously an important site. However, after a few hundred metres of dirt track, we retreated and had a good look at the map on a sign just where the track left the road. It appeared that the sanctuary was a number of kilometres up the track near the top of the mountain. Discretion is the better part of valour – we decided to move on.
We arrived at Lake Mornou, a reservoir that we had identified as a potential wild camping spot. Park4Night had a possible site on the southern side of the lake but as we tracked down the north eastern side, north of Lidoriki, we found an excellent option. The large flat area of grass, just off the road, is set high above the lake with the mountains on either side dusted with snow. The road is very quiet with just an occasional vehicle passing, mainly farmers in pick-up trucks. We put out some chairs and admired the view whilst drinking tea. I put the lamb shoulder on to cook – slow roasted on top of potatoes with garlic slivers inserted into the lamb and lots of lemon juice squeezed over it all. I felt a little guilty as we were visited by a flock of sheep who fed on the meagre quantity of grass around the van. Dogs led the sheep and goats to the areas of pasture and ensured that none were left behind. There was no shepherd with them – the dogs did it all. Very impressive.

Photos: A great idea for a picnic table, framing that lovely view; Another lovely view; Our first waterfall of the holiday; Our wild camping site; The invasion of the sheep.