Solving mysteries sometimes seems a way of life in the expat world.
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| Sherlock Holmes - street art Alicante, Spain |
We've had a series of them lately but the one that had us stumped the longest, was finally solved after five hours of investigation by three detectives, aka, technicians.
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| The Stone House on the Hill from the olive grove |
Our Stone House on the Hill in the Greek Peloponnese has been the perfect setting for mysteries, particularly this year. Not the cloak-and-dagger type but more the everyday who-or-what dunnit-types that require the investigative skills of plumbers, carpenters, electricians and technology gurus.
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| The Lemon Tree Patio on a dark and stormy day |
Our dark and stormy winter provided a perfect backdrop for -- perhaps in retrospect, it could even have been an accomplice in -- the string of mysteries that have been solved in recent weeks.
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| Sunshine and blooms welcomed us to Monte Carlo |
Those of you following our travel tales on Substack know that in late February we took off on a ten-day escapade through the Italian and French Rivieras. The trip's purpose was three-fold: celebrating The Scout's birthday, taking a break from what seems the longest, storm-ridden winter in Mani history, and taking advantage of a favorite Trusted Housesitter's willingness to extend his stay in our area to care of our elderly Princess Cat.
While we were gone, the mysteries accumulated as rapidly as our collection of Agatha Christie's books and included: Some random interior and exterior lights not working - around here you don't know if it is one inter-related problem or two separate problems. Then the internet shorted out without rhyme nor reason as to why. However, if it was unplugged for a time, then reconnected, it would work for a few days and poof. . . quit again.
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| Fireplace is not just for atmosphere |
The Mother of all Mysteries though was why the furnace quit working. Anyone who's lived in, stayed in or visited a stone home during a wet, cold winter knows just how cold and damp the interior can be - especially when the heat goes off. Thankfully, our sitter got by with the electric wall heaters and fireplace, and he worked around the other malfunctions.
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| Mystery of the Darkened Stairway continues. . . |
Unraveling the mysteries began the day after we returned. The first investigator on the scene was Roland, a tall English-speaking German electrician, who's been in the area some 20 years. He came close to solving the case of the malfunctioning lights, but not quite. Some clue has eluded him and he's still working the case of the darkened exterior stairway. He's assured us he'll be back when he can solve it.
George, the local Greek Wi-Fi guru is an answer man with a booming voice and hearty laugh. He was also stumped by the circumstances of our faulty internet. It worked in both stormy and calm weather, until it didn't. There was no pattern of clues that could tie it directly to the weather nor the operating system itself. His investigation was thwarted by another storm that hit the same day he came to the house. The wind and rain were so strong it was too dangerous to put up a ladder, let alone climb it to the roof to check the antennae and its SIM card. While he didn't identify the culprit, he was able to do some computerized investigations and adjustments and get us up and running again.
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| The boiler/furnace in its below ground dungeon |
The mystery that had required the most detective work was the furnace, or oil burner, as they call them here. Basically, it is a heating system that burns oil to heat water that will run through radiators in the house to heat it. By whatever name, ours is a fancy, new-fangled thing we installed a year ago. Perhaps, too new-fangled, we snarled to each other, after the first investigators/technicians left.
This team, an English-speaking Greek duo from Kalamata, who've been our go-to guys for years, spent two hours in the dungeon-like space where it sits at the side of the house trying to figure out the problem. Despite their handbooks and a variety of tools, they tried and failed to find answers.
Their parting words were, "You must call the installer, He will need to reprogram the system."
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| The furnace dungeon and evaporation, not smoke, from it |
We summoned Spiros, the Greek-speaking technician who'd installed our space-age, computerized furnace. He arrived at 8:30 on a Saturday morning. As the hours passed, we'd hear an occasional sputtering as the ignition sparked and then silence. Sputtering and silence for hours. We offered him the installation manual, an encyclopedia-sized guide he'd used for getting the thing programmed when he installed it.
He declined it, smiling and assuring us it was a 'mikro provlema' (little problem). It may have been small, but it certainly had him stumped.
Just before noon, with the help of Google Translate, he pronounced the mystery was solved and the furnace fixed!
The pontiki, a mouse, did it!
The little critter had chewed a little wire in half. Once that part was replaced, it started right up!
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| The Pontiki Did It |
We now have Dimitri, our neighborhood carpenter, figuring out the mystery of how to enclose the angled, uneven opening to the dungeon to prevent further pontiki provlemas!.
