Charcoal

Just starting to catch up an entire missed month of blips. I’ll work backwards from today, otherwise I might never reach the present !
The sea is now covered in charcoal blown over in the smoke from the terrible forest fires near Athens and in Northern Evia. This is now building up on the beaches at the edge of the sea. So sad to think of all that destruction… some of the fires are still burning after more than a week. 

I had a super boat ride with 3 friends today on their small inflatable motor boat… We explored some of the rocky coast and caves  to the south of Zarka , and swam a couple of times off the boat. Getting back into the boat was quite a challenge but we all managed it though not all of us very elegantly. There were some huge thick patches of charcoal in the sea…  looking a bit like oil slicks .. and we had black pieces all over us when we got out. 
We spotted some interesting birds on our way… shags, pallid swifts, rock pigeons, and a peregrine.