Nudging Where the Wild Things Are into second place, The Rough Guide to Greece (2008 edition) is likely my most read book, its pages either falling out, dense in highlighter pen or soiled with tzatziki-stained fingerprints. I could quote passages verbatim as a party trick (so far unrequested).
Despite this minor obsession, until now, I’ve never actually ventured to Greece, much less cycled here, possibly put off by this quote from the slender cycling section: ‘Many Greek drivers consider cyclists a lower form of life, on a par with the snakes regularly found run over’.
Having stalked Greece from 2,000 miles away in the UK, an email from Chris Ward, the founder of Breakaway Greece cycling holidays in the Peloponnese, arrived in my inbox early in 2023 highlighting the historic lack of the Mediterranean nation in our Big Ride and event pages, with an offer to stay at his Villa Rosa soon following.
A £70, four-hour flight from Bristol later and I’m driving with resident snapper Joe at 2am under a moonless sky to the Peloponnese
