Heatwave and the fire engine.

We have had a heatwave here now for over a week, with temperatures well into the mid 40's but also a wind from the south. Those of you in England will be familiar with a wind chill factor. This is the same in reverse. The temperature is 44 but it feels more like 54!!! This has a number of drawbacks:-
1) Its too hot and sticky to do ANYTHING!
2) The amount of extra electricity to power the air conditioning in the resorts blacks out the whole island as the grid cannot cope.
3) We get fires.....sometimes caused by idiots discarding fag ends without realising the risks at this time of year.....
Yesterday there were a number of local fires, the worst being in Elounda, consuming 700 Stremma (a Stremma is 1000 square metres) of land and houses, and taking two days to put out. Very scary! The photo above is of the local fire engine flying over my house on its way to deal with the fire. There are a number of planes and just the one helicopter, they pick up water from the sea and drop it on fires.
Well done all the men who worked so hard.....

End of Term

Well it is end of term at the local schools and to celebrate they held a competition for art and poetry on the theme of Peace. Prizes were given for the best in each age group at a party in the square. Traditional Cretan music and dancing was provided and went on until around 12 o'clock (very early night here!)