Up, Then Down, Then Up Again...

After four days, the rain eases enough to finally allow me to escape Pyli, where things have all gone a little bit Groundhog Day. Relocating from my bed to the hotel dining room for a daily breakfast of bread, honey, jam, sliced (plastic) meat and cheese, and a boiled egg, I then hustle across the street through the downpour to the first cafe of the day. This provides a morning coffee and some wifi to work on some photos, but no power. Once the laptop is threatening to shut down due to low battery, a second cafe across the street provides an early afternoon change of scene, more wifi and a plug socket.Finding decent sustenance is a challenge - there are a multitude of fast food and kebab shops, but few establishments offering up anything real other than grilled meat and potatoes (chips).  Only one taverna seems to be open through the day time, and in fact the other main taverna in town has closed down. Gradually I do locate some places serving more of a varied diet, but I'm not reluctant to leave Pyli when the time comes.This issue of finding decent and varied food is common throughout my journey across Greece, where shops and supermarkets are in short supply in the smaller villages and towns that I come across. A taverna is fairly common in all but the tiniest villages, but they tend to have a fairly standard offering and finding places serving a more varied selection, or selling general supplies, especially packaged, relatively portable, but not unhealthy food, is proving difficult. The reason for this is not that Greeks eat poorly. Admittedly, they do eat a lot of meat - large chops of pork, lamb and sometimes beef, are common in tavernas, and the kebab is seen more as a staple here rather than the guilty, drunken 2am regret that it often resembles in the UK. On any given evening, Athens is full of mostly sober people sat around eating delicious slices (gyros, resembling döner but of much better quality) or chunks (souvlaki/kalamaki, resembling shish) of pork or lamb with tzatziki, onion, tomato and chips all wrapped up in a thick pita bread. The meat is of good quality and its all pretty delicious, and supports my long held belief that in principle, if made in the right way, kebabs are not inherently unhealthy in the way we seem to consider them in the UK! Greek salads (cucumber, tomato, onion, olives, and feta in olive oil) are ubiquitous. And at the same time, most households use bountiful, fresh vegetables for home cooking, often grown on their own land or bought from weekly markets or delivery vans doing the rounds of the smaller villages. I've never seen so many big, beefy tomatoes in markets, supermarkets and homes as I have here.In principle, this is great, but carrying a few days of fresh vegetables and cooking from scratch on a small camping cookset, or when staying in a hotel room without a kitchen, isn't all that practical. And, whilst tasty meat and chips is a treat after a day of riding, eventually I find myself just wanting something a bit more varied, and...wholesome.  Trying to get hold of a fresh, hearty soup, either pre-made to re-heat myself or in a taverna, has proved virtually impossible so far...