BOAT TRIP IN LAKE VOLVI

The time has come at last…

 

…to write about the place where I was born and grew up; to write about lake Volvi.

 

You’re probably thinking, “Sure, everyone loves their home town.”

 

I agree, but when your home town has something so unique, and it’s up to you to highlight it, you simply do it. This lake has been so unappreciated for years now. Maybe it has not been developed the way it should have, or maybe they simply took it away from the limelight.

 

It is, however, one of the places worth visiting.

One afternoon, I took my captain and together we took his boat out in the open sea.

 

It’s nice if you know a local captain and it’s even nicer if that captain happens to be your father. You know how it is; him showing you around his region, with such pride, as if it’s the best place in the world. Ever since I was a little girl he’s been telling me that ‘liparia’ (also known as ‘Macedonian shad’) is the tastiest fish. I’ve never liked it particularly, but now that I know that it’s endemic to the lake and is not to be found anywhere else in the world, I have somewhat reconsidered.

 

Nowhere else in the world, imagine that!

 

History Lesson

 

Lake Volvi is the second largest in Greece with a total area of 68 square kilometers and a depth of 20 meters. It is located on the spot where once lay Lake Mygdonia, which occupied the entire basin of ancient Mygdonia.

 

According to the myth, lake Volvi (Bolbe) took its name from a Nymph, who had a son with Hercules, named Olynthos. It is also said that in Rentina, on the shores of river Erechios (or Richios), Aristotle built his school of Philosophy. The area of Rentina is also believed to be the place where the great tragedian Euripides was killed and buried.

 

I didn’t know any of these, I admit. Dad, I am sorry.

 

Also, let me tell you the following, for they are important.

 

The area around lake Volvi is a rare ecosystem with hydrophilous forests, hydro-habitats, mudflats, rivers, shrublands, and agricultural areas that together form one of the most important wetlands in Greece. In the region there are more than:
 

- 200 bird species

- 34 mammal species

- 19 amphibian and reptile species

- 21 fish species (including our good old Liparia)

 

All these species indeed exist here.

It is so nice having traveled the entire world but still being able to enjoy a boat ride in your home town, and feeling that it’s the best thing you’ve done in a long time. Nothing compares to the sense you get from being at home. And by home I don’t mean one’s flat or the four walls. By home I mean the place where your heart finds peace.




To put it differently, it’s nice to have a village to go back to.

 

To get back to when you get weary of all the rest, to get in a boat and disappear. To see the ducks, the Greek flags, the fishnets, the boats, the mountain, the water, and nothing else. If you’ve got a lake, you are particularly lucky and I want you in my team. If not, take a trip around beautiful Greece and you will find many such corners, far from the ordinary and popular destinations. I have grown tired of both the ordinary AND the popular, honestly.

 

Even if you don’t have a village, you can still adopt one and change it every now and then.