This was to be a day of a lot of driving to the villages in the south where they grow the Mastic and solve all problem. So, we began with a quicker (and earlier) breakfast with less documentation

and then took a picture of our villa from the back on the patio that we seldom used (because there were so many nice places to sit) and then began our journey not stopping until we reached the town of Vesa where we took a few pictures from the car and noted the beautiful purple flowers before heading off to Mesta where we stopped in a taverna to get some liquids and leave some liquids as Suzanne and Sarah demonstrate while the saints looked down on us. The town of Mesta is a maze of twisty little lanes between house all of which are oriented in interior fashion to keep the pirates out, so once we finished the entry we were in very narrow passageways

some of which were blocked by buildings before we came to a marked street and exited and then found an entrance to help find our way back to the car with Suzanne posing at the entrance to the complex (which is said to be the place where Christopher Columbus came from) and a warning sign telling us to beware of the dog and we then passed the church and a few more narrow passage ways (though less narrow because they would admit cars) before we headed on to the town of Pyrgi.

The town of Pyrgi is a unique place. Someone started the pattern of painting black and white on the houses (and other structures) and so the whole town has a Disneyland-esque feel to it. This consumed us (and certainly the camera) as we took many pictures to record this and in so doing got a good sense of the town

before turning to artistic photos of a church through an archway and the clock tower on the church in the town square and some more black and white decorations as we ascending the steps of the clock only to see that there were more levels to climb some of which Ben climbed as Ed and Sarah posed and we recorded yet another black and white street and this unusual grafifti and the grafitti looked better with the black and white background. We made our way down the narrow street past an ad for the drink that was going to change us and came back to the square to a restaurant where Ed and Sarah Suzanne Ben and I settled and extolled the virtues of the Mast drink (not your father's Mountain Dew) before bread salad and tsatsiki came allowing me to make this face (my best yet, I believe) while waiting for the pizza to arrive. Sarah was using the Blackberry as we left the table and Suzanne led us onward for a few more shots of the black and white town even on pictures of the prophets and some last views of the narrow streets of the town before we headed off to the mastic groves where the white paint was often a give away for which trees were to be sapped

and we even cut some of our own to have in the car before we headed to the beach at Vroulidia which is accurately described as one of the most beautiful small beaches on any Greek island. It was a walk down to the beach and so I left the camera above after taking these shots to give the setting and came down and enjoyed the setting and the refreshing swim.

Next we went to Mavra Viola, the black beach where we were met with warning signs and explored the beach

and made this movie that gave a sense of the sounds of the waves breaking over the stones (almost symphonic, but not particularly swimmable) and so we left the people on the beach and headed on to Komi which is a fairly populated beach

though there was plenty of room to swim and a waiter brought me a Mythos beer (almost like the mirage lady) before Suzanne beckoned me away so that we might stop in the pottery town of Armolia which was unfortunately closed though it did have beautiful arches as we made our way to Limnos and before dinner took the obligatory phone booth pictures before Ed and Sarah Suzanne and Ben and I settled down with the menu and I had a bit of ouzo to go with the bread cheese balls cheese and meat pies Greek salad tsatsiki and other dishes leading up to meat dishes that we ordered. After I broke the chair (too much saganacki, perhaps) Ben and Suzanne posed for many pictures

and my camera seemed to rotate around the table so that these pictures of me Ed and Sarah me, again Ben in camera mode me, a third time and Ben could be taken before we looked down at the beach recorded Sarah's found ring, Ben me Ed Sarah Ed and Sarah and, at last, ate our watermelon before recording the upside down heart in the tree that grew within the taverna. The owners were nice enough to let us take a picture of them in their kitchen and then we recorded Jeff's prior presence at the restaurant. Why didn't he tell us?