Off-road excursions


West Macedonia (July 2001)

First of all a clarification is in order. Macedonia is an area of Greece, not a different country. If you are interested to learn why I mention that, please click on this link.

With this clarification done, let's focus on the trip. This one was not a very ... off-road trip. It was actually a very on-road one, as we travelled more than 1000 km on paved roads. However, since this was the first real long trip with the Musso, and since I got the chance to give it a ... shower (read below), I decided to include it here.

The paved part of the trip was uneventfull. Musso's independent front suspension, maybe not the best setup for rock crawling, but it certainly provides excellent handling characteristics on pavement. It took us about 7 hours (including the stops) to reach our first destination, which was the town of Siatista. We kept a relatively low speed, even on highways due to Lena's pregnancy and our wish to enjoy the ride. The only problem during this part of the trip, was that one of the exhaust rubber hangers broke, and the exhaust was making contact with the axle when cornering hard right. It was easily replaced at the local Daewoo shop at Kozani (the city where we finally stayed at), although it looks as if this will be a standard item in my spare parts box, in the future.

From Siatista, we had to travel to Kozani (about 25 km from Siatista, and a total of around 550 km from Athens), because the single hotel in Siatista did not want to let us stay there, because of Dushka, our dog. One hotel owner lost my money, another one got them. We finally stayed at a lovely hotel called "Nefeli" at the outskirts of Kozani.

The next few days were spend travelling around in the area, mostly on the just opened part of the A2 Egnatia Highway, which when finished will connect the western-most city of Northern Greece, Igoumenitsa, with the east part of Macedonia, on the traces of the ancient Egnatia Odos. Due to Lena's early pregnancy, we stayed mainly on paved roads, even though the desire to go off-road was itching me. Finally, the day before we started our return trip, we took Musso for a shower, in the waters of Aliakmonas River. Have a look at the pictures below, for some of the places we've been.

Siatista is a lovely little town up in the mountains of West Macedonia. It is surrounded by bald mountain-tops, as can be seen in the picture here, and its existence is almost totally based on its furs production. During the days we stayed there, I was amazed to learn more and more things about how furs are made. Very interesting indeed. Fresh mountain air, very nice and friendly people and ... no noise. All a city guy like me wants!

My son is trying the new Remington 870 pump action shotgun, the newest addition to my arsenal. More about this firearm will be added here, later on.

One of the most pictoresque cities in Greece, is Kastoria, a furs center situated next to a beautiful lake. We went there twice, and during our second visit, we ate at a lovely restaurant, which served local food. The taste of pork was never better. Cooked in a variety of ways (more than 20 different dishes were based on pork), it was a real pleasure. After a good dinner, nothing better than taking on the grass, next to the lake front.

We discovered this lovely spot on a river outside Grevena, a town about 30 km west of Siatista. People were enjoying swimming in this lovely river.,

Of course Sergios didn't miss the opportunity to take a dive. If only I have remembered to note the name of this small river!

Musso is getting ready to take a ... shower, in Aliakmonas river, by almost getting stack in this mud pit. Thank God low gears and those Mud Terrains took me out of it, because those trees in the back ground might be a bit far for the winch cable, and there is no Pull-Pal in my kit yet.

OK, we are out of trouble and now we know the spots to avoid. Sergios, are you ready to take pictures?

First pass from a relatively shallow spot, but guess what? A pothhole sucked my left rear wheel. Ooops, not funny, but I got through it, having enough forward momentum.

OK Sergios, ready for some more water splashing?

And the final pass, washing our under-carriage well. I enjoyed those moments, and I am sure Musso did also, it hasn't touch any dirt during the whole trip, so I am sure it was looking forward to it. My only passenger at this moment was ... Dushka, Lena prefering the safety of the river bank, and Sergios taking pictures.

For our way home, we passed through Kalambaka, an area famous worldwide for its monasteries, which are build on top of some huge rocks, called Meteora. In the old years, the monks used to be winched up in a net. The view is spectacular, breathtaking even, as these rocks are really big. One wonders how they build those monasteries up there.

Trip Summary : An almost totally uneventful trip, except from that rubber exhaust hanger, which was easily replaced at the local Daewoo dealer, in Kozani. Western Macedonia is not a very popular touristic area. So not too many people visit it in the summer. Visitors can access the area from the south (from Larissa, through Tyrnavos and Elassona, a very beautiful road ending up in a lovely lake, just outside Kozani), from the east, through the A2 Highway or from the West (from Igoumenitsa and then Giannina and Grevena). The main industry of the area we visited is furs, and you can see hundrends of signs of furs shops, some of them actually in beautiful villas. The wierd thing is that most signs are in Greek and in ... Russian, it looks as if there is some heavy exporting towards the ex-USSR countries. Mink coats are relatively cheap, starting from 1500 US$ up to 2500 US$ depending on the color and the size. There are several off-road paths, unfortunatelly, we were not able to take any of them, due to the above mentionned reasons. Some of the best, are in dry small rivers, which end up in Aliakmonas River, and which are not very difficult to follow. The area should be better visited during the spring, as in the summer the yellowish color of dry grass is a bit monotonous. The Kastoria area is preferable, due to its forests and the lake. If you decide to go there, do not forget to visit the "Krontiris Restaurant". It is situated in the city of Kastoria, just follow the road which coasts around the lake, after you enter the city. The Albanian borders are about 40 km away, and due to the large number of illegal immigrants entering the country from there, the Border patrol is on constant alert, we saw several road blocks. Be prepared to show your papers and be submitted to inspection of your vehicle. All in all, a nice 4 days excursion to break the monotony of the city's life.

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