Settling in on Rhodes

So, Rhodes is lovely. Not that I have seen a lot of it yet. I have been busy settling into my place and little 'hood, and grabbing doses of sun when it shines.

Yesterday I went for a walk and found a stretch of rocky beach about a block from home.... Rocky beach indeed, tho some cool rocks! Took this one "home" but that does not mean it will necessarily "come home" with me. I am having enough challenges managing luggage weight limits without adding rocks into the mix!
This is evidence of a good soaking of the Mediterranean sea, quite unintentional...
This is the spot I was exploring when I got "waved"...
... and on a completely different note, these are the elements of my coffee adventure...
So, day 1 here went out to get a coffee, found nothing open right near by (except a place that had a Nescafe coin-op thing!), so figured there was no time like the present to get brewing at home. While I was at the grocery store, I realized that I had not looked in the kitchen to see what kind of brewing device there was, so I was in the dark in more ways than one when I got to the store. Not that knowledge of the red thingy (above) would have helped me. It was definitely all Greek to me as I was buying coffee and cream.... The coffee I selected because it was a relatively small package and seemed to be the most popular one, so it must be good, right? All I could do was squeeze it to tell it was ground, and that was that.... The cream situation confounded me. Initially made a selection from the coffee section (as most cream in Europe is unrefrigerated), but found real milk and cream in the dairy case later. Great. Now, picking one out. I studied them quite a bit before picking this one out. It wasn't until I took this picture that I noticed it must be for whipping cream! Ha! At least it wasn't buttermilk or something....

I had never used one of these coffee pots before, but I was surprised at how well I figured it out. The biggest challenge was figuring out what went in where.... and what portions to use. Oh, and I dumped out the water initially, and replaced it with bottled water, filled the thingee with coffee and off we go to the stove! I must have gotten something right because it tasted awesome! Had a second cup. And today awoke looking forward to my own coffee. I hope it tastes just as good when the whipping cream runs out and I scale the richness back a bit...

Other initial observations:

• One of the only downsides here is the strong sulfur smell of the water... I'm using bottled water to brush my teeth, as the sulfur smell had me gagging... eeek!... Not too bad for a shower though. Anyways, has me needing to remember to buy enough water for cooking and such
• You cannot flush any paper here, at all.... leads to much managing of plastic bags....
• And no recycling! boo! (a little surprising, as this seemed to be quite sophisticated in Athens)
  
• It's raining pretty frequently, but never for really long, and it burns off quickly.
• The mosquitos here are EVIL!
• No wifi, no land-fi, no fi at all has me struggling to adapt a bit... but I'm managing with an awesome internet cafe half a block away (it was cool lighting, lots of new computers, a full bar and food!)
• Not nearly as much culture shock as I'd thought: lots of English speakers and a very modern grocery store have me easing in nicely

That's it for now, more soon.....