Harley and the Holy Mountain - John Mole

 

I have reservations at two ‘monasteries of the rocks’ perched like seabird’s eyries on pinnacles jutting out from the cliff. What possessed the founders? To get closer to God? Fear of Pirates? Imitate the hermit’s vertiginous cave? It is a fasting day so I set out on a sugar high with nutty halva and dark chestnut honey with yesterday’s bread.

Simonopetra is a five mile hike from Dafni along the coast road, a dirt track bulldozed out of the ancient footpath. The temperature must be over thirty degrees with no breeze and a malevolent sun. Soon hat, boots and all my clothes, including those inside my backpack, are sodden with sweat. The road is covered in thick yellow dust. I hold my breath and put my hand over my eyes and nose as trucks and SUVs barrel past, leaving sandstorms in their wake that stucco my damp clothes and turn me into a terracotta warrior. None of them stop to offer a lift. But the views are lovely. Over the indigo sea is the middle finger of the Halkidiki, Sifonia, a land of package holidays, fast food, discos and general voluptuousness, the antithesis of ascetic denial in which I slouch along with growing reluctance.

Ahead of me through a haze of heat and dust the Holy Mountain taunts me with the hidden promise of a point to it all. My experience of Athos so far is that there is no revelation, no glimpse of the divine, no inspiration other than what you bring in yourself. You don’t get spiritual enlightenment handed on a plate. You have to work hard at it with effort and sacrifice. But before this you need a kind of notion, an intuition of what you are striving for.

After an hour or so I stop to rest on a bench by a shady culvert, drink a litre of water, and eat an apple. A minibus pulls up beside me. The driver, a bearded young man, offers me a lift. I put a hand on my chest and twitch my eyebrows up and down. He’s not taken in by the Levantine gesture.

“You don’t have to pay,” he says in English.

“Thank you. I like to walk.”

“It is very hot.”

“Tama,” I say in Greek, penance. I point piously at the sky. This time he’s taken in by pilgrim posing.

“God is with us,” he says and drives off. I brush the dust of his wake off my half-eaten apple.

“Stupid bugger,” I dis myself as I plod in the afternoon heat, regretting my vainglory, wishing I had accepted the lift. On the crest of every rise, round every bend on the sinuous track I expect to see the monastery and all I see is the next rise and the next hairpin.

At last, round a bend, perched on its rock, is Simonopetra. The joy! The soggy spring in the step! The guest house is outside the main gate, a modern remodelling of an old building, probably mule stables. The assistant guest master, a young monk with horn-rims and hipster beard, serves Turkish Delight, water, coffee and fruity raki before taking me to my room. I am billeted with two friendly Greeks, retired civil servants from Athens, sleepy Nikos, 60, and fussy, Giorgos, 65 who wears green pyjamas and takes pills out of a dosette box. They are appalled by my filth and amazed that anyone would walk when they could get a bus. I go straight to the bathroom and launder the dust off my person and all my belongings in an icy shower. I realise my mistake after every item is soaked and I have nothing dry to preserve monastic modesty but a handkerchief-sized towel. I put wet shirt and trousers back on, squelch back to the room, collapse on the bed in a stupor and fall fast asleep with grandmotherly warnings of rheumatism ringing in the mind’s ear.

My room mates wake me for vespers at five. My clothes are damp but I am no more stiff and achy than usual. We go through the main gate and up a steep cobbled path under a tunnel into a courtyard bordered by the church, the refectory and the monks’ quarters. Simonopetra is famous for its chanting and does not disappoint. I stay in the narthex out of politeness and join the exodus into the refectory without challenge. The meal is already set. We stand for Grace, gazing at the spectacular frescoes. At the first bell we sit down and scoff quickly in silence. If we are too slow the abbott will signal the end of the meal before we finish. The food is delicious, chick pea stew, coleslaw, creamy feta, apples. At the second bell we may drink an excellent red wine. A lector in a pulpit reads from the life of the saint of the day. Chatterboxes are hushed by a patrolling supervisor. On the third bell we stand for Grace. The monks file out and we follow, passing between the abbot at the door with a hand raised in blessing and the cooks bent double in apology for their shortcomings. We go into church for the veneration of the right hand of St. Mary Magdalene, the True Cross and other holy relics, whose provenance I do not catch….

….Leigh Fermor has a wonderful description of the exultant bravado of Simonopetra growing out of the rock, balconied storey heaped on storey, the heart-stopping view from the fragile balconies down the sheer cliff face to the shore. I try to recapture his exuberance as he made a paper plane and threw it over the balcony, his childlike delight in seeing it hover and circle into the void until it vanished in the rocks and trees far below. I make mine out of a sheet of glossy paper I find in the self-serve kitchenette beside the refectory, an insert fallen out of a newspaper advertising skimpy beachwear, redundant information here. In my youth I was an expert on paper planes and use unforgotten skill to furnish it with broad wings, flaps and winglets. I barely let go when the wind whisks it away skywards, never to be seen again. Ah well. There’s no point in recreating another’s elation, I should find my own.

The bloody sun sets over a shot silk sea. Leaning on the rail I give thanks that I am here to see it. Who to? I don’t know. Just thanks. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Meet Harley - an antiquated 50cc motorbike, top speed 25mph, who carried me on the backroads of Greece from the island of Evia to deliver the collected Jeeves and Wooster to a Moldovan monk on Mount Athos, a self-governing state run by monks.

Harley and the Holy Mountain is a journey through the heart of Greece to its soul. We pass sites and sights from prehistory to the present: a Mycenaean beehive tomb, 3500 years old; the body of a Russian saint, who teleported pilaff; a refugee camp in a chicken factory; and many other extraordinary places as well as tavernas, cafes, cheap hotels and anywhere else I can find conversation and a jug of wine.

Our road trip is based on a lifetime's love of Greece. It is seasoned with experiences and memories, absurdity and humour, treats and discomforts, the terrors and boredom of the slow lane, and above all comedy. With a glimmer of enlightenment at the end.

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