Friday...

This morning John, Di and I were good peeps and went off to the gym at the Droushia Heights Hotel - we probably needed to after the humungous amount of cake we consumed yesterday!!

It felt like hard going but I am pleased to report I managed to cycle further on the static bike than I have managed previously and therefore used up more calories!  I do a 20 minute session but struggle because I cannot adjust the bike any further so I am stretching like made to peddle and have nothing to support my back.  What I achieve may seem peanuts to some but it is better than nothing!!!

We took our cups of lemon tea out on the verandah of the hotel taking advantage of the beautiful morning and the wonderful view.

We were puzzled by a largish boat which seemed to be drifting around in circles close into the coast - and wondered almost jokingly if it was full of asylum seekers - we were gobsmacked to learn later that we had been correct in our assumption - apparently the boat contained 84 refugees including 30 children and it was drifting from Kato Pyrgos towards Latchi.

Rumour has it that it was abandoned by the captain near the Turkish enclave of Kokkina and the port police had to bring the vessel into Latchi as it was the nearest place and apparently there is a second boat that they are keeping their eye on.

On our return home we were greeted by the tell-tale signs that one of the cats had been out hunting - feathers!  The majority of which were under the dining table - just feathers and no body parts so not sure what happened to the remainder but watching Boo-Boo snoozing with a rather full belly on show I can guess!  Sadly he never seems to catch any of the numerous common house sparrows that reside next door he goes for the lovely little black capped song birds unfortunately.

We managed to get a game of pickleball this afternoon - Jeff came to make up the four and thoroughly enjoyed the challenge of playing with Liselotte's John and my John with me bringing up the rear!  It was a very hard and very fast session and as it was a glorious day I ended up very hot and sticky.

On my return to Mum and Dads I could still hear a kitten crying - I had heard it on Tuesday when I was there and it seemed to be coming from exactly the same place.

Mum said she and Dad had been to investigate and there was a kitten stuck up an olive tree.  Poor thing may well have been there since Tuesday in that case so Mum and I went off to investigate.  There was a terrified kitten stuck up the tree (this is not a photo of the actual one but it is near enough!).

I managed to climb up the tree but it was just a finger tip out of reach - as it was semi-feral I needed to scruff it otherwise I was going to be torn to shreds.  I couldn't shake it out of the tree so sent mum off to get a broom so I could 'encourage' it in a downwards direction but whilst she was away getting it I managed to get it to come nearer and grabbed it by the scruff and managed to get it down.

My good deed was an expensive one - in so doing I managed to lose one of my expensive earrings which John had brought me back from Dubai.  I couldn't believe my luck - although that is about par for the course for us.  Yesterday we splashed out on a new laptop from Public - only to find the bloody thing wouldn't work when we got it home and we had to have a paddy in the shop to get our money back.  Never ever take any advice from us - we have no luck whatsoever.

We were treated to the most glorious of sunsets as we got back home.  Currently the sun is in the most awkward of positions as we drive up the hill near the Egyptians but shortly when the clocks change we will be coming home in the dark.

Some forward planning this morning meant that we had tea ready and waiting for us on our return - even though it had been very hot during the day the evenings are much cooler and so I got the slow cooker out and threw together a sausage casserole which smelt divine as we walked through the door.  Oh how we are looking forward to winter proper - log fires, comfort food and long evenings in front of the TV

We thought tonight we ought to check out the kerosene heater we bought last year for the conservatory but which we never used.  These heaters are OK but they are a bit smelly and we aren't sure how much condensation it is going to cause but in about 5 minutes the conservatory was bouncing!