3X Awarded Blog on Cultural Travel since May 2012 focused on Cultural Heritage & Ecology. Here you find authentic posts in En/Gr thoroughly edited and researched with my photos. They host a traveller’s approach and the vision for a safer world, a home where everyone may find the space to experience active love, to explore purposeful creativity.
2012 © Copyright. All rights reserved – revised MARCH 2019
Lighthouses may look terrifying as they stand isolated up on the rocks at the mercy of elements, encircled by water, by menacing sea. From the height of their solitary presence, austere, minimal, they blink at regular intervals. Beacons of predictability, their light emits comfort and reassurance.
photo Lisa Samloglou
Lighthouses mark endings at the pinpoint of a peninsula. At the fingertip of a hand turning into a welcoming bay it indicates from afar where to reach security in the middle of a sudden storm.
Lighthouses can be seen as points of debarkations too, inviting fresh beginnings; they may provide a stop to take a breath and restart or continue the journey.
photo Lisa Samloglou
Here is the lighthouse of Agios Nikolaos at the fingertip of the peninsula of Kokka which borders the gulf of Vourkari, one of the safest natural ports of the Mediterranean sea.
photo Lisa Samloglou
The lighthouse is located just across the main port of Korissia in the Aegean sea.
Built in 1831 by The French Company of Lighthouses, it is one of the two oldest beacons in the Greek network. It is the first that was ever lit in Cyclades and the second in Greece. It belongs to the traditional Greek beacons, the square type, with a height of 8 meters and focal height 32 meters.
The lighthouse is built on the ruins of a temple of Poseidon.
photo Lisa Samloglou
Today it looks like a whitewashed stone fortress glued to the church of Saint Nicolas, protector for the mariners for the Christians.
Where the affluent industrial community of Kokka used to be, today there are only ruins to be seen as we walk across the seaside. There were warehouses and housing facilities installed at the end of the 19th century by the British owners that were supplying with coal the passing steamboats on their way to the busier ports of the time, those of Syros or Chios.
photo Lisa Samloglou
photo Lisa Samloglou
On top of the one, still erect, stand two adjacent squares out of rock, stubborn and resistant to the weather and the human neglect. They are supervising inside and outside of the harbor. At this point used to sit the men assigned to signal for the arrival of the boats (simatoreio) and to help the boats navigate safely inside-out (pilotagio).
The peninsula is lying like a dormant camel with three hunches.
photo Lisa Samloglou
Fascinated by the stunning sunset those interested in the historic associations will stop to take a breathe at the landmark before a narrow string of land known as the passage of Katsonis. In August 1789 captain Katsonis, a Russian officer turned-pirate to combat the Turks in the Aegean, escaped the Turkish fleet. Finding his ship entrapped in the bay of Vourkari he had the idea to pull the vessel, buttered with pig fat, over wood planks placed on the rocky soil. The repercussions by the enraged Turks were catastrophic for Kea. The associations are stored both in the naming and on the marble inscription at the point.
photo Lisa Samloglou
photo Lisa Samloglou
Every time I walk to the lighthouse the experience is new and stunning. Is it the light, the air, or my mood that enfolds me in an atmosphere painted with all the hues – from the romantic to thriller.
Which scenes from a film set in a lighthouse come to your mind?
Have you read Virginia Woolf’s novel ‘To the Lighthouse’?
Is there a poem or a painting that this landscape brings to mind, that you would like to share with us – in the comments – or with your companions?
photo Lisa Samloglou
It is my belief that as long as our imagination and memory is enriched with references and every landscape is wrapped up with images, each location becomes alive. It escapes the realm of the ‘picturesque’ and starts ‘talking to us’; it earns a substance, it becomes a living character narrating stories. And we establish a lively relationship with it, we understand it, we care for it, its present, past and future…
If you were to write your own script in the Lighthouse which atmosphere would you choose? Would you choose the sunset, a sunny or a stormy day with strong winds and clouds? What kind of light? Give it a try!
A number of my blog posts here listed in English – most also available in Greek – may enrich your experience from visiting or living in Kea/Tzia.
They are all photographed, written, edited by me.
You are invited to share indicating the sources, as I always do.
Wishing you a resourceful and enjoyable journey!
2012 © Copyright. All rights reserved – revised MARCH 2019
More bilingual posts about Kea from an insider’s point of view, if you navigate my blog:
Walking the trail to the ancient Karthea, at the Greek island of
Take a walk in the unseen side of the Greek island of Kea, from the Byzantine times
Archaeology/Mediterranean:
Athens hosts ‘Princesses’ of Mediterranean at the Museum of Cycladic Art
Texts and Poetic prose with photos from the island of Kea:
Walking by the sea after a long winter…
A tree is blooming at the Greek island of Kea/Gr
Rewarding stops at Chora or Ioulida of the Cycladic island of Kea
More about Greek Lighthouses in the LIGHTHOUSES OF GREECE http://www.faroi.com/
Urban travel tales 
Να το ξαναπερπατήσουμε κι αυτό το καλοκαίρι Peny! Κάθε φορά όμοιο, αλλά όχι ίδιο. Wait & see…:)
Θα διαλεγα Ηλιοβασίλεμα με αυγουστιατκους ανέμους ,όπως ακριβώς το περπάτησαμε …….!
Πολύ καλο!!!! Περιμένουμε κι ´αλλο.