It has now been well over a week that we're staying with and working for "In the Heart of the Bees" and we're enjoying it a lot! Writing this I had to count the days because it feels like we've been her for ages already.

A couple of weeks ago before we got to Lefkada we talked about what more we wanted from the trip and we agreed we wanted to spend some more time around one place. Combining that with some work on e.g. a farm could be interesting and save us some expenses. So we started looking around, we were already liking Greece so we figured we'd focus there. In the end we used WWOOF to contact some working-holiday destinations around us. It took some days to get any replies at all but fortunately one was interested in us and close by, here in the Tzoumerka area. Then it took a painful amount of time to get the contact person on the phone and get practical information. But then it was settled quickly: we spoke Sunday afternoon and Monday evening we were, settling in. (One small catch was we were given a wrong address at first, but fortunately the drive wasn't much longer.)

So we found our way to a cooperative in the town of Kalloni, in the hills of Tzoumerka. It's run by two Greek couples, one couple in their fifties and one in their thirties, and they have traveling volunteers almost all the time (mostly from the WorkAway platform, link to their ad, EDIT: they have a new WWOOF listing now). By origin it's a blueberry farm, one of the few in Greece (though the berries seem to grow exceptionally well here), the first shrub sprouting about ago 12 years. Though there is also some beekeeping, there are a couple of goats, a handful of sheep and various trees for olives, cherries and more. Since about three years they also have the 'Taverna', where they sell their own products and serve food and drinks on the weekends. A taverna is an informal Greek bar / restaurant, serving drinks and food, typically from local productions with wine in carafes for not high prices. The Taverna is also the base of operations of the group and most meals (especially lunch) are had here together.

We are sleeping in our camper still, which is comfortable as we never had to move all our stuff out again. We are parked on the terrace of the tavern, which also doubles as the town square. On the other side is the town's church and we have an open view of steep mountains across.
The welcome as we arrived was unlike anything we've seen, after mere moments we are apparently considered as members of the group and we are expected to make ourselves completely at home. We are shown around the tavern and given a key, mostly so we can use the toilets at any time. We shouldn't ask permissions for grabbing anything to eat or drink, as everything is for us too now (and there is loads...).

When we arrived there was already a Greek-Belgian couple working here for a week, and after a couple days an English-French couple came too, making us 6 volunteers plus the local 4. (Kind of funny how the three couples are all mixed nationalities!)

Our days typically look as follows: start in the Taverna for breakfast and coffee, usually 09:00-ish. We are briefed on tasks and sent to work, until about 14:00 to 15:00, when we have a late and huge lunch, usually with everyone. One of the women is the unofficial cook and does all the meals. And she does it amazingly well! Despite the fact that she's is a bit disgruntled that 5 out of us 6 are vegetarian.
Then it's siesta, as the lunch is killing and it's to hot to do anything. (Now in the June we're getting 33° to 35°C every day consistently, though with some clouds and bits of rain.) Most take a nap or relax otherwise. Then early in the evening sometimes something still needs doing and we do that. Dinner hardly an official meal, it's leftovers from lunches around 21:00.
Like most work-aways the idea is we work about 4 hours a day for 6 days a week and in return we get accommodation and all meals. Our hours are not strictly managed though and we can more or less simply not work when we don't want to.

So far we have done weeding and planting in the big vegetable garden of one of the guys, painting of the a room in an abandoned house they are restoring, hauling stuff and helping in the Taverna last Sunday. Last Sunday was also live music: with a clarinet, mandolin and singing they played traditional songs and guests did traditional dances accordingly.
And this morning we tried the first of the blueberry picking. This is done early in the morning to beat the heat, usually they harvest only from 06:00 to 10:00. This particular morning wasn't very productive, on the some 800 trees there were only few berries, better luck in a week.
The work isn't too much and it's fun to do something other than typing at a laptop for work. We're learning some about farming, beekeeping and even tavern-keeping.

So far for fun we've gone running an early morning, I've done two awesome mountainbike rides on the forest roads in the hills and we've taken a day off for a tiny trek. For this trek we late afternoon and climbed to a mountain hut, arriving only just before dark because of the heat (though it was still terribly hot). We slept there and the next day started early to climb a peak and then hike back down all the way to the car.
Federica has good opportunity here to do some PhD tasks and aside from this all we get to loads of reading.

Oh, and according to tradition we have been granted Greek names: Federica has become 'Frederiki' and Robert is 'Thodoris' (though we can't really figure out why the later makes sense).
We're expecting to stay here about 2 more weeks, after which we will take about 2-3 weeks to slowly make our way back to the Netherlands, past Genova again, where we have appointments. (Congrats on the upcoming wedding K&N, we're very excited!)

I'm really trying at this dance, I swear...