2010.10.12It’s still heavily cloudy in the second day morning. However, while we were having breakfast, I saw a hint of sunshine at the horizon. I quickly finished up my plate, grabbed my gears and run to the Starbucks place. The location has a panoramic view of one of Corfu’s most famous landmarks, Vlacherna and Pontikonisi or “Mouse Island”. Pontikonisi is said to be Odysseus’ ship turned to stone. It is often identified with Corfu in Homer‘s Odyssey. When I got to the spot, a ray of sunshine just penetrated the thick cloud and projected the light on these two tiny islands. It lasted for 5 minutes and the sky took on a leaden cast again. I’d call it the “stolen sunshine”.
At least it’s not raining. We went to see Corfu Old Town after breakfast. The signature of the town is its maze-like narrow streets and elegant buildings with blended style influenced by different European countries. It’s fun to drive on these streets. It vividly reminded me of Matt Damon’s car chasing scene in movie “The Bourne Identity”. Many small shops and restaurants are gathered in the allays around Agios Spyridon, a red-domed tower dominating the Corfu Town. In the summer, the alleys can be packed with tourists. But at this time of the season, there were more local people than visitors.
We had a snack at The Liston. It is a line of Cafes in Esplanade. My wife had a nice-looking Fried Banana dessert and I had a Greek Coffee. We picked a table along the street, so we could enjoy our meal while watching people and pigeons in the park.
Corfu is famous for its beautiful coast line and beach resorts. It is a popular destination for family vacation. We planned to circle around the northern island in the afternoon, but the featureless sky made everything looked pale, so we decided to cut our tour short to go to Ermones, right across the narrow waist of the island. We didn’t find any interesting scene in it neighboring village, Vatos, but Ermones is quite picturesque. The road led to a seclude beach and the small car showed its advantage here. The sun played hide-and-seek game with us. I made some shoots with bracket in order to try HDR later.
When we were having dinner at hotel, we noticed that not only we were the only Asians, but we were the only young couples there – all other people were seniors. It doesn’t mean they were less energetic. There was a band performing old time songs in the hotel’s bar. These people in their 60s or 70s were dancing, talking and laughing loudly till the midnight. We switched room one floor up so we wouldn’t here noise from the dinner hall, but we heard the party more clearly. They were enjoying their lives to the fullest.
