the times Saturday June 11 2022Travel 51
Easy cycling
on the Mani
A
s life gathers pace and we
make up for time lost over
the past two years, it is easy
to forget how, under a blue,
plane-free sky in 2020,
there were many of us who made
post-pandemic promises to travel
differently — less often, more
meaningfully, slower.
Not everyone needed a global
catastrophe to reach this conclusion.
Oli Broom, whom I met in the autumn
of 2017, was inspired by a mammoth
cycle ride from London to Australia to
launch a boutique cycling-holiday
company, the Slow Cyclist. Rwanda and
Romania — an unlikely duo — were
the first destinations he offered. Now
he’s added two holidays in Greece: one
in the northern mainland region
around Zagori; the other in the south,
concentrating on the Mani peninsula,
the middle prong of the Peloponnese.
And so I find myself with a group of
nine like-minded friends, all — how
shall I put it — gently nudging towards
the back end of middle age, but still
fulfilling the description in our briefing
notes of “curious travellers with a bit
of juice in their legs”.
Our Greek odyssey
begins
in what is
beguilingly
known as the
Deep Mani, the
rugged
southern and
southwestern
reaches of the
peninsula. Its
residents claim
to be the only
true Maniots,
dismissing those
of the Outer Mani
(the northwestern
region) and the Lower
Mani (the northeastern
region) as false descendants of those
ancient Spartan warriors who famously
ensured that the Mani was never
truly conquered.
The base for the first three nights of
the six-night trip is at Citta dei Nicliani,
a tiny hotel of character and comfort in
the heart of Kitta, a typical Maniot
village of cheek-by-jowl stone towers.
They’re the legacy of ancient feuding
families who, in a classic tale of one-
upmanship, built sturdy, square
strongholds, each higher than the next,
from which to rain down boulders and
bullets on their neighbours.
These days, life at Citta dei Nicliani is
more about food and wine than brutal
vendettas, the hotel’s young owner
being a formidable connoisseur and
collector of fine wine who is happy to
share the contents of his cellar with his
guests. And Slow Cyclist trips are
mercifully as much about the finer
indulgences in life as they are about
pedal power — pleasure not pain.
In which spirit, our bikes are electric
— brand new Fantic models made in
Italy to take the grind out of cycling,
particularly on the uphill bits, of
which there are many. Saddles come
with gel pads — although padded Lycrashorts are still recommended — and
panniers are stocked with water and jars
of nuts to keep hydration and energy
levels high.
Our days unfold at a mixed pace;
ferocious bursts of pedalling tempered
by regular stops, the occasional bumpy
track balanced by miles of smooth
tarmac. This is perfect, largely car-free,
cycling terrain: a wild, barren landscape
of remote mountain hamlets and
untamed olive groves, of steep
hillsides plunging to
sparkling blue, pebble
beaches, of
wildflowers
running riot
through fields
and hedgerows.
At Cape
Matapan, in a
last gasp of
rocky
desolation,
the Mani
peninsula falls
into the sea at
the so-called most
southerly tip of
mainland Europe (a
claim dependent on
whether you count Punta de
Tarifa in Andalusia). Down to one side,
accessible only by boat, is a small cave
believed to be the entrance to Hades.
It’s dramatic stuff.
We swim, sometimes twice a day; we
picnic (in considerable style); we walk
and we learn, chaperoned by Nick
Exarheas (fully versed in Greek and
Maniot history) and Vangelis Batzakas
(biking supremo who can fix punctures
with his eyes closed).
On the fourth day we make the
switch from the Deep Mani to the
Outer Mani, dropping down to the
exquisite seaside village of Limeni and
moving on by speedboat to Kardamyli,
the small town made famous by the
author Patrick Leigh Fermor, who made
his home here.
In contrast to the south, the north
feels positively lush. A parched,
windswept palette gives way to verdant
green; the high Taygetos Mountains,
still patchy with snow, carve deep river
gorges and forested secret valleys as
they crash towards the coast.
These trips can go one of two ways at
Kardamyli: either up into the hills
to Ilias, with accommodation at the
home of British couple James and
Charlotte Heneage, or down to the seaat Liodentra, an exclusive-use,
beachside villa on the edge of town.
I can’t speak for the latter, but Ilias is
exquisite, its rooms divided among a
number of stone houses and cottages,
which are woven through terraced
meadows of olives and wildflowers. A
360-degree panorama from the terrace
of the main house takes in high peaks,
deep ravines, ripples of silvery olive
trees and the sparkling spread of the
Gulf of Messenia into which the setting
sun sinks each golden evening.
The flow of each day is a little
different to what it was in the south –
more walking, less cycling, more history,
this time delivered by James, a historian,
author and raconteur who brings tales
of ancient and modern Greece to life.
He takes us to multiple tiny Byzantine
churches with elaborately frescoed
interiors, some high in the mountains,
some closer to Kardamyli. We have a
tour of Leigh Fermor’s house, recently
restored by the Benaki Museum of
Athens and the focal point of
Kardamyli’s literary and cultural festival,
which takes place in October and is run
by James and Charlotte.
For some reason, our slow travel
experience feels incredibly fast. Those
glimpses of Maniot life and Maniot
landscapes leave us longing for more.
Action-packed days mean there’s never
a dull moment, barely a chance to read
a book, to lounge in a deckchair in the
sun or to potter round Kardamyli at
leisure. Some of our friends arrived a
couple of days early; others hung on for
a day or two more. This, I would say, is
the way to do it — wrapping the glories
of a cycling trip in a little downtime,
creeping a little deeper beneath the
skin of one of the most beautiful
regions of Greece. Pamela GoodmanPamela Goodman was a
guest of the Slow Cyclist,
which can organise
private and mixed-group
tours and has six nights’
full board from £3,600pp,
including bike hire and
guides (theslowcyclist.co.uk).
Fly to Kalamata or AthensNeed to
knowCape TainaronVilla Iliastrees stunted in prickly pear hedgerows,
the mountains scraped down to the bare
rock, the arid afternoon sky so blue it’s
almost black. Here Kitta, a mini San
Gimignano, was the site of the last blood
feud in the Mani, in 1871, one so vicious the
Greek army had to intervene.
Seaside Gerolimenas is your last chance
for a fish lunch (Kyrimai is a good bet, with
mains from £14; kyrimai.gr), and there’s a
pretty beach, Gyalia, just south. Vathia, the
last village before Cape Tainaron, has
become the totem image of the Mani, with
its clutch of stone towers in a savage land
high over the sea (stay outside Vathia at
Tainaron Blue Retreat, an exquisitely
restored tower house, with an infinity pool
and superb restaurant only for guests. B&B
doubles from £212; tainaron-blue.com).
That end-of-the-world feel increases at
Cape Tainaron. Here are the jumbled re-
mains of a large settlement, destroyed by
pirates 2,000 years ago, that surrounded
the sanctuary of Poseidon; along with an
oracle, it famously had a psychopomp who
would escort murderers into Hades to ask
the souls of their victims for forgiveness.
Nearby is the ruined chapel of Agios Aso-
maton, the “bodiless saint” — St Michael,
the soul-gatherer.
In Greece, perhaps especially in the
fantastical Mani, cultural memories
rarely die.peninsula
treesstuntdi iklKardamyliAgios NikolaosALAMY; LOUISA NIKOLAIDOU