Enough amazing Kalamata hospitality; it's time to bike! We rise early but not too early to pack our clean clothes, sleeping bag, and tent. Our packs are stuffed courtesy of three most delectable gifts from our hosts: Kalamata olives, 1.5L of Kalamata olive oil straight from their tap downstairs - Nana's uncle makes the oil, and he lives not 500m down the road - and the largest quarter-loaf of dense freshly baked bread. Perfect for the ride to Sparti, which promises to be arduous indeed. A quick look at the elevation profiles of this route on Google Earth confirms the many warnings from our hosts and the schoolteachers at Nana's school: the road climbs up nearly 1400m into the mountains over 35km before snaking down into Sparti. Not a steep grade, but 1400m is nothing to scoff at; in fact, it makes for our largest continuous ascent thus far, a dubious title previously held by the 1200m climb up the Pyrenees...
...but we have found that there is no particular secret to climbing mountains. First you start, then you keep going; once you have strength and endurance enough to bike for a few hours, the rest comes down to persistence. On the way up from Kalamata, we pass several stretches of concrete wall alongside the highway with environmentally-themed graffiti, all of it done by this one artist who goes by the moniker "Skitsofrenis". There was a massive forest fire in these mountains a couple of years ago, and many locals bemoan the irrevocable loss of the beautiful mountainside forests between Kalamata and Sparti - and, for this reason, many of the graffiti murals make reference to this fire.
The road switchbacks again and again, dropping shortly around the back of the first hill before climbing up into this magnificent valley through cold stretches of shadow created by the sheer cliffs that block out the still-rising sun. It winds around the cliff faces, climbing yet more into a small town where we purchase two apples from a roadside vendor - only to find, shortly up the hill, that one is overripe and the other rotten; not a particularly great use of 1€, but there is nothing we can do about that now. It climbs yet more, and we now have an uninterrupted view of the mountains opposite. Some of the faces lie still barren, the rock punctuated only by the charred remains of trees; others have begun the slow regeneration process...
...and we wind around the scenery for some time, our bodies kept improbably warm by the effort of ascending. As we said before, there is no secret; you keep working until you reach the top, in which we succeed around 1300. This being Europe, the top is adorned with a café-restaurant-hotel complex overlooking the descent below and the valley into Sparti. As picturesque as the climb was, it has nothing on this view - and yet it is not something you can accurately convey in photographs. The view is made inestimably better by the effort it requires to earn it, by the knowledge that you have arrived at the vantage point by nothing other than the force and strength of your own two legs...
...we stop in the restaurant for a delicious taverna meal of feta and salad and fried fish and bean soup and other such delicacies, which we gobble down heartily. Nothing builds hunger quite like a continuous 1400m climb, and we are starving! Afterwards, we retire to the café to warm up over cappucino; much to our delight, the bartender (who also happened to be our waiter from the restaurant) draws a happy face and heart on our respective drinks. He inquires as to how two cyclists came to be on this mountaintop, which is remote enough that even cars do not frequent it with any regularity. As we have done countless times before, we explain the general route of our trip; it is strange to speak of it now that we are nearing the end, for the distance left to cover hardly seems impressive when compared with the long journey down from Copenhagen and around the Iberian peninsula. Athletic spirit is inscribed deep in the Greek culture, and most people bear at least a slight reverence for those who carry forth the torch...
...stepping out of the café, we note that the only other restaurant patrons - a family group of roughly eight or so - are all wearing winter jackets, and at this point we finally realize exactly how cold it is. The heat of physical effort has worn off, and there is only the cooling effect of wind wicking away sweat. We quickly throw on our long underwear and jackets for the descent, but even this is not really enough; we shiver the whole way down, our fingers and toes numbing in the icy mountain wind - and yet, even as we cower in our multiple layers of clothing, we cannot suppress our admiration for the surroundings. The road winds underneath rock outcroppings, through small sections of cave, turning around the contours of the cliff face down into the lower valleys into Sparti. Teeth chattering, we wind our way down, down, down into the small towns that dot the mountainside - and finally, after roughly half an hour of coasting downhill, we rest our bikes against a tree in Sparti and head into the nearest market for some food and much-needed warmth. This is a reminder that we cannot take the weather for granted anymore. We have seen both extremes on this trip: first the blistering heat of Spain and Portugal, and now the bone-slicing mountain cold. This sort of cold is unknown to me, having come from the land of uniformly cold winters; most days are passably warm still, but the nights are another story...
...and we start on our way out of Sparti - the city itself is nothing spectacular, so we decide to keep going. About 5km up the road the way forward is proscribed by a host of signs warning vehicles to take the detour up along the smaller peripheral roads, but we are stubborn and inquisitive enough to barge through this makeshift blockade and try our luck. This turns out to be a fortunate decision; the signs keep most vehicles from taking this stretch of road, so we are relatively unmolested by the usual harrowing stream of traffic. We start to wonder if perhaps the signs are not needed at all - but the reason for them soon becomes apparent, for another 5km up the way an entire section of road has been destroyed by a landslide. Perhaps another result of the massive storm we were caught in not two weeks earlier? Whatever the reason, the destroyed section has not disappeared but has rather subsided about 2m, and a gravel ramp has been laid down to it so the road service can begin repairs. The road service being noticeably absent, we realize that this would make a perfect campsite - protected from the road, which in any event is sparsely used in its current condition, and with some nice flat blacktop to set our stove on. A long day; we have earned this sleep, and will certainly need it for our continued path to Athens...