Despite rumors of hot beer and lousy food in fact Algarve did turn out very well. The Sunflower guide was of the best I have used and the fairly easy strolls you can do around Lagos turned into this year’s first “Walk & Eat” experience. A small report with some restaurant tips, bus timetables and general info about Lagos and the walks can be found at http://www.islandwalking.com/lagos.html.

The new photo album is at http://www.islandwalking.com/piwigo/. Most photo gallery software seem to have more bugs than features, so this is another fresh start. But at least there are now finally photos from The Algarve. I have had a look before, but now that Piwigo have released pLoader for MacOS X there is a chance I will actually start using it… Let us see how it goes.

Note 1: I uploaded everything “as is”. Some are failures or experiments. Some could be OK after decent cropping.

Note 2: These are the first attempts using my new Canon PowerShot SX200 IS.

This newer series by Sunflower Books concentrates on shorter walks and strolls. The tips for good eating have so far been a bit different from mine…

Walk & Eat Kefalonia:

Walk & Eat Rhodes:

German Rother is also translated into English. Small and handy, but again, for Greece it is only Crete that is covered (one for east, one for west):

More in the Book Shop.

Some like these guides. They have very few for Greece and to me they look like something for “experts”. Not for me then, I am just a happy amateur:

Crete – The White Mountains

Western Crete – Walking in the Kissamos

See more in the Book Shop.

Generally my favorite series of walking guides. These are the ones that cover Greece:

For more look in the Book Shop.

These no-nonsense booklets written by Lance Chilton are among the best I have used (I have not used them all though). Very efficiently they concentrate on just very detailed walk descriptions and nothing else. No BS. His maps are also great at showing exactly what you need to see:

More info in the Book Shop.

For the next few days I will add overviews of some of the useful walking guides available for your Islandwalking pleasure. All of these has been used by myself. Starting off with “Walking the Greek Islands” (fitting title!) by Graf Editions. These are most of Dieter Graf’s books translated into English:

These are handy books, but many walks are difficult to follow, partly because of lack of updates, but also because the books are not extremely well written in the first place. Or lost in translation? One would expect that the addition of instructive pictures would be helpful, but unfortunately they too rarely are.

See Book Shop.

For this years expeditions these are the walking guides I will use. It will come as no surprise that Sunflower’s Landscape Guides are heavily represented on this list. These books are also added to my Book Shop!

Landscapes of Algrave:

Landscapes of Costa Brava:

Landscapes of Eastern Provence:

Walk & Eat Kefalonia:

Introducing a great culinary achievement from MrWalker, immodestly self-titled as “MrWalker’s Fetaburger”:

pure beef burgers, frozen
hamburger buns
Tabasco sauce
Greek feta-cheese
garlic sliced thinly
onion (shallots recommended) sliced thinly
dry oregano

Select your favorite pure beef burgers (make them yourself, or buy the best frozen ones you can find) and hamburger buns (white bread). While the beef burgers are still frozen, marinate one (or both) sides with Tabasco sauce. The sauce will stay put as it freezes directly on the surface. The burgers should then be grilled in a regular kitchen oven. Other kinds of barbecue can be used, but the heat must come from above. When almost done, put a thick slice of (preferably) real Greek feta-cheese (you can select any brand of feta here, depending on taste and availability). Let the cheese fry with the burger for the last couple of minutes.

Before putting the feta on the burger, cover it with a few thin slices of garlic and some chopped or sliced onion (shallots recommended) and put lots of (dry) oregano on top.

To drink: Preferably Retsina, of course

A really simple, but still very, very tasty meal!