Levkada (General Part)
28/05/2013 9:48:42
We start with gastronomy: in Levkada we had occasion to try some typical local dishes. "Savoro" is a pickled blue fish from Levkada area. One of the most traditional sweets is the oil pastel.
In Karya we had occasion to try a dish from the island: zucchini and baked potatoes. Also we try the "Fava": a greek dish that has greater fame in Santorini.
In Dragano, southern interior of the island of Levkada, we ate eggplant breaded, stuffed tomatoes and the famous yoghurt tsaziki with zucchini and garlic. We also tried the Greek yogurt with honey for dessert.
On the coast you can frequently find Greek dishes in some restaurants. When food is truly local, the best is to venture inland and visit the restaurants of the small towns.
On tourism, we first analyzed the main destination in Levkada: Nidri. There we see a first line of bars and restaurants with the typical English ads for tourists. The buildings are very modern prefabricated on plastic and aluminum.
In the second line there are mainly shops, supermarkets, etc. In the third line we saw a chaotic urban development with a mixture of old houses and new apartments. Returning to the boardwalk we find the statue of Aristotle Onassis who presides it.
On the boardwalk we see many large boats for tourists trips. There are also many charter vessels -same way as we saw in Croatia-. The movement of boats and charter boats is quite chaotic, nothing to do with the scheduled organization that we observed in Paxos -surprised by its high efficiency-.
Moving towards the south we could visit Vassiliki and Sivota. In these two destinations freelings are different. Tourism businesses are mixed with the old houses and decorated with plants and flowers, the streets keep the traditional character.
In Sivota we observed different styles of tourist housing. Here are some examples with stone buildings, only one floor, and other cement-dominated and more floors.
As for the customs, this time we look especially dresses. As you can imagine the old clothes are no longer used. Only in small towns sometimes we see older women who wear all black and use headscarves.
We visited the museum of Levkada in which you can see the old traditional typical costumes. Levkada has a nice museum with many costumes from around the world that is worth visiting. That is because, since 1962, they make a major international festival of dance, and costumes have been keeping all this time.
Agriculture is less important than before. They produce oil on a smaller scale; today there are six wineries that produce wine in Levkada. Fishing is also minor. They still fish in the lakes but all is sold in Messology (on the continent). There is a typical caviar which is dried under the sun and then is covered with wax.
