Peloponnese Autumn Bulbs of Sparta A Greentours Trip Report 29th October to 6th November 2011 Led by Tristan Lafranchis Day 1 Saturday 29th October From London to Diakopto Everyone is at Heathrow bright and early and before long we are on our way to Athens’s spanking new airport where the group meets Tristan. After two hours drive we reach our hotel at Diakopto and have a nice dinner at Costa’s before a much needed sleep. Day 2 Sunday 30st October Kerinitis valley: Plataniotissa & Kerinia Weather is sunny as we leave Diakopto to the Kerinitis valley. After a short stop to enjoy the scenery of hillsides and mountains above the blue Gulf of Corinth, we drive to a narrow gully shaded by Plane trees. The stony slopes are home of many large-flowered Cyclamen hederifolium, perhaps var. confusum, whilst some beautiful Campanula versicolor grow on the vertical rocks. We then park the van by a chapel on the top of a hillside. A nice Colchicum bivonae is waiting for us on the edge of the parking place. It is still cool at this altitude (1000 m) when we start to explore the hillside. We first find a dozen and then hundreds of Biarum tenuifolium, a strange and dark plant usually found in very small number and surprisingly abundant today. On the rocky edge of the ridge we discover a very good show of perfectly fresh Sternbergia sicula visited by a Clouded Yellow. As temperatures rise Wall Browns and Brown Argus start to fly around. Walking down from the van we find nice Crocus cancellatus and a few more Colchicum bivonae. After a lunch in the sun we drive down to Plataniotissa when Andrew shouts «Stop!». He jumps out of the van, runs to a rock on the edge of the track and catches a very fine adult of Leopard Snake, a reptile he really wanted to find on this tour. Admired and photographed, this nicely marked snake is released and we move to the village where we stop to visit a huge and very old Plane Tree whose hollow base hosts a chapel. We drive down to the Kerinitis valley and park at the bottom of the hillside. We walk up for half an hour to reach a flat area carpeted with the endemic Colchicum peloponnesiacum. The small pink 1 © Greentours Limited. Visit www.greentours.co.uk for further details. Telephone 01298 83563 flowers of this local endemic grow with a background of cultivated coastal plain and the blue sea of the Gulf of Corinth. Day 3 Monday 31st October Diakopto to Githio A warm sunny day saw us reaching the acropolis of Mycenae where we could spend most of the morning looking for flowers and butterflies among 40 centuries-old stones. The landscape here is a mosaic of orange orchards, olive groves, maquis and rocky slopes, punctuated with fine stands of Cupressus sempervirens. The rains had been light this autumn but this didn’t prevent us finding our first Cyclamen graecum and a few more Sternbergia sicula. Soon after Tripoli we enjoyed our first crocuses in a neglected almond orchard at Manthirea where both Crocus hadriaticus and Crocus biflorus subspecies melantherus are growing together. There are also many other flowers including a nice patch of Vicia villosa discovered by Marion. After lunch we moved on southwards to Sparta and then up to a spring on the eastern side of Mt. Taygetos. Snowdrops bloom under the Plane trees together with various ferns. Climbing on the track we discover in a meadow five nice flowers of Colchicum boissieri, a scarce species found in a few mountains in Southern and Central Greece as well as Southern Turkey. A one-hour drive through hillsides brings us to the comfortable Pantheon Hotel on the sea-front in Gythio, our base for the following days. Day 4 Tuesday 1st November Northern Mani Weather is mostly cloudy this morning when we head towards Mani, the central finger of the southern Peloponnese, a rough, dry and stony peninsula. Our first stop produces lots of the gorgeous blue Crocus goulimyi, white Crocus boryi and Crocus laevigatus, some tiny pink Colchicum psaridis and dry-looking Allium callimischon. We then move to Platsa and have our picnic under pine trees near the nice monastery of St Nicolas with a beautiful view of the coast. Sun alternates with clouds with a cool wind. There is no Anemone in the grazed meadows but a fine large pale blue head of spiny Echinops spinosissimus and many large-flowered daisies Bellis sylvestris. We also find a baby Empusa pennata with its distinctively curved abdomen. On the way back we briefly stop at the bottom of a cliff near the village of Langada for Campanula versicolor. A second long stop is dedicated to a walk on an old paved road, going through neglected plots invaded by oaks and flowers. The many Cyclamen graecum are mixed with Cyclamen hederifolium and the mauve Crocus goulimyi. Andrew, who turns kilos of stones, manages to catch a young Balkan Whip Snake. We also find several kinds of grasshoppers. 2 © Greentours Limited. Visit www.greentours.co.uk for further details. Telephone 01298 83563 Day 5 Wednesday 2nd November Monemvasia Weather is still windy and uncertain but it looks better to the east where we are heading to. We walk along a track to find Colchicum cupanii and various colour forms of Crocus goulimyi which cover the small openings in the scrub and in the gully. We have our picnic near the chapel above Foutia where white-flowered Crocus goulimyi var. leucanthus grows in very large numbers, with a wonderful view of Monemvasia and the Aegean Sea. The sun is out and the light perfect for photographers. On the way down we stop to enjoy a good display of Cyclamen hederifolium var. confusum on the stone walls and the grassy terraces by Foutia. We spend most of the afternoon at Monemvasia, climbing to the fortified top where we discover hundred of Colchicum cupanii growing mixed with Cyclamen graecum, a symphony in pink and a good chance to compare many specimens and get a better idea of the variations of these delicate plants. The view over the old village and its orange-grey roofs over the blue sea, with pale blue mountains in the distance, is simply wonderful. Day 6 Thursday 3rd November Southern Mani A bright sun in a pure blue sky above the sea is what we first see when opening our windows this morning. We first stop at Kelefa castle, the impressive ruins of a Turkish fortress built in the late 17th century to control the access to the Mani. There are many small birds but very few flowers on this dry rocky plateau but we manage to find about twenty Spiranthes spiralis. Driving on narrow and windy roads we go walking through olive groves and dry meadows. Large Crocus niveus grows along the stone walls whilst Cyclamen graecum is very numerous below the trees. We also find two species of squill, small violet Prospero autumnalis and tall white-flowered Urginea maritima. Nicholas finds a female Balkan Grayling and later spots a Booted Eagle. We then reach the byzantine church of Harouda, a pleasant spot for lunch with many large-flowered Sternbergia sicula growing in the olive-groves nearby. Moving further south we stop for a few Narcissus serotinus growing around the road on dry terraces. We then discover the typical square towers of the Maniotes at Vathia, used during the fiercely fought blood feuds, where opponents sought to destroy rival towers and avenge whatever had gone before and so on…. All was quiet today indeed given the depopulation of this wild and windswept Grecian outpost which has almost been abandoned to the Black Redstarts. Day 7 Friday 4th November Southern Parnon Our first stop of this sunny but rather cool day is in a small bay where a wrecked ship lies in the middle of a long sandy beach. Just out of the van Denise spots a large dolphin swimming slowly just below us. On the rocky bank above the road are blooming the first Narcissus tazetta and a sheltered disused quarry produces both male and female Pygmy Skippers together with a few other butterflies. We find more butterflies in the next bay a few kilometers further east, including a very late Hungarian Skipper. Male Carob trees are strongly attractive to bees. When we reach the sea a Cormorant and a Little Egret fly away to safer places. 3 © Greentours Limited. Visit www.greentours.co.uk for further details. Telephone 01298 83563 At the village of Valchioti we leave the main road to Monemvasia to drive through cultivated and then wild hillsides. We stop on a stony hillside grazed by a flock of sheep. Here grow many Crocus niveus, a few Crocus laevigatus in a flat area. Here grow many Crocus cancellatus with pale lilac flowers, mostly on the track and in the ploughed areas. By the goat farm are large stands of Crocus hadriaticus. We have lunch in the shelter of a shepherds house by a few bright green Aleppo Pines. After lunch, the long stop at the pass allows us to test our progress during this week as we progressively find five species of white Crocus growing together. Day 8 Saturday 5th November To Mystras and Corinth For the first time there is no wind this morning and a perfect blue sky. We spend two hours at the archaeological site of Mystras where we explored the ruins and monasteries. The hazy views across the plain below revealed an ocean of olive groves and behind us the rising bulk of Taygetos.