The other side of the pool

I went to the pool this morning after a light breakfast of coffee, coffee and Greek yogourt with honey. The sun has shone from a nearly cloudless and blue sky all day. I sat on a yellow sunbed beside a yellow umbrella and watched the blue lapping wavelets, and was reminded of David Hockney's California pool paintings.

The taverna under the single store roof in the picture was the original enterprise here many years ago.  At some point they added a series of rooms in small buildings as accommodation and the pool followed. Just to the right of the taverna is a small road which separates the hotel from the beach and the wide vistas across the Ionian sea to other islands in the distance. We are hoping to go to Ithaca next Tuesday on Captain Vangelis' tour boat which will be a long day trip. Sounds good to us especially as the weather seems to have set fair for the next week while we are here, unlike the week before which was rather moody and cool.

The water is apparently cold, according to the various swimmers who swam round and round. I have to be very hot to go in and so far haven't found it necessary. Instead I watched out for the swallows and house martins that are plentiful here. The swallows in particular loved this water as well, but more as a source for drinking. They swirled around in the air and then made their final approaches, although each from a different angle and skimmed a mouthful as they dipped the beaks into the tiny waves formed by the breeze.

Late in the afternoon I returned to the pool and sat on the side which this picture is featuring as I wanted to try to catch a picture of the swallows drinking on the wing. I've brought my Fujifilm camera on this trip and not my big Canon and many lenses.  The Fuji has a fixed prime lens so taking fast shutter speed images of swallows in flight is a bit testing, but I like a challenge. I have added a couple of cropped pictures to give you an idea not only of the birds but also of the blue water which I have been forced to look at all day while the sun shone. Tomorrow I may try again, having seen the results of my efforts on the computer screen. But then again I may be more original. I shall have to wait and see. We may go exploring if my foot can stand the strain.