May 12: Mount Parnassus
Mrs. Fifi laid out a breakfast spread sufficient to serve a full dining room of guests. For just the two of us. Her super fresh spinach pies were dripping butter, so good. I worried about getting fat, but today’s hike (17 kilometers!) seemed unlikely to present options for lunch, so it would probably balance out. She warned us that there might be mean dogs on the path to Mt. Parnassus.
Today, instead of traveling from town to town as usual, we were climbing up a mountain. Mount Parnassus, to be exact-once the haunt of gods and nymphs and now a popular ski resort. Instead of staying in a hotel, we’d be sleeping in a mountain hut. More on that in a bit.
The walk out of Polydrosos was pretty. Athenians have started buying up weekend cottages in the area, but just out of town you get into farmland and forest with no hint of nearby urbanites.
Trekking Hellas has always been clear about the necessity of navigation for self-guided hikers. They send meticulously curated GPX files, but those GPX tracks don’t always follow the obvious trails, and Greek trails aren’t always obvious. This was definitely the case as we got higher up the mountain and further into the piney woods. At one point, we found ourselves nearly crawling under pine branches up a slope; I’m still not sure that was right, though Chris insisted that this was what our GPX trailblazer had done. The way the GPX works is this: If the pioneer made a bad decision, you’re going to make it too!
The last part of the trail to Defner Mountain Hut goes across several ski slopes with their accompanying dirt service roads. The terrain got even rocker underfoot, if such a thing was possible. The last part of this hike seemed interminable. We kept thinking, “Surely we are almost there!” And we kept being wrong.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with the term “mountain hut,” I will now explain. Huts are a big part of mountaineering and high trekking culture. They aren’t “huts” in the Appalachian Trail sense of a tumble-down shack that can provide a roof and (maybe) four walls, perhaps with bunks and vomit-stained mattresses, and bees, but nothing in the way of amenities such as a dining room or running water. Instead, they are small hostels with beds for a number of people, toilets and sinks, often showers, and kitchens and dining rooms. Huts are everywhere in the Alps, where they provide inexpensive shelter and camaraderie for long-distance trekkers who want to sleep (or just eat) high in the mountains.
Amenities vary. A few modern huts have private rooms and en suite bathrooms. Others have large rooms of bunk beds and shared bathrooms, like dorms. Still others place mattresses on platforms, and guests pile in next to one another. Cozy. The point is simply to have a warm, sheltered place to sleep while participating in vigorous, high-altitude activity. You don’t come to a hut seeking luxury. Or privacy.
Defner Mountain Hut on Parnassus is on the bare-bones end of huts but is also extremely hospitable. Our host, Kostis, greeted us with enthusiasm but in a hushed voice. When we arrived, the dining tables were full of trainee mountain guides taking a mountain navigation test, and he didn’t want to disturb them.
Kostis showed us the amenities. Just inside the exterior door is the kitchen and one dining room. This room has several tables with long benches that double as beds at night. At the far end of the dining room were the lavatories, with four toilets and sinks. The south side of the hut contains a sort of sun porch, a narrow room with several smaller tables walled all around with windows looking out across the hills toward the Gulf of Corinth.
Defner hut has one bedroom with two twin beds against the walls and then a sort of double-layer mattress platform loft, with mattresses above and below. Kostis gave us the loft all to ourselves-luxury, considering that there was space for a good five or six people! The loft contained several filthy mattresses, quilts, and pillows. We’d brought sleeping bag liner sacks to put ourselves in, but there’s really no way to avoid contact with much-used bedding in these situations. At least we didn’t have to snuggle with strangers.
Our suitcases had been transported to the hut, which we hadn’t expected and which wasn’t necessary; they took up limited space, and we really didn’t need our computers and formalwear from the previous week’s wedding up on the mountain.
Though some Alpine huts can be reached only on foot or by helicopter, it’s possible to drive to Defner on a dirt road. Plenty of people drive up there just to enjoy a meal in the mountains and do some light hiking from there.
We arrived at about 4:00. Dinner wasn’t until 7. Kostis offered to make me a snack, and I realized I was ravenously hungry. He quickly fried up a couple of local sausages, which I ate in complete silence while the would-be guides fretted with their paper maps and compasses.
Back indoors, it was time for dinner. Kostis served everyone the same thing; that’s the deal with huts. After we ate, we sat and talked with some of the guides. The leader was a German who had come to train new Greek guides, part of Greece’s effort to up its outdoor tourism game. We had a great time until Kostis cut off the power at 10. That’s also standard hut practice; electricity requires a generator, which requires fuel. Anyone who stays in a hut overnight is well advised to bring a headlamp or at least a flashlight.
Chris and I climbed up to our loft and slid into our sleeping bag liners. Maybe four other guys were sleeping below us. The room was heated with a woodstove, which created a soft red light all night and kept the room quite warm.
We later compared notes on our nocturnal visits to the toilets. Though our bedroom was somewhat illuminated by the stove, the dining room outside it was pitch black. It was also filled with dudes sleeping on the benches around the tables, snoring peacefully. I felt my away along sliding my feet in my socks, terrified to reach out to touch a surface lest it be someone’s face.