Christoforos, Social Worker in METAdrasi’s Accommodation Facility for Unaccompanied Minors in Samos, recounts:

“A few days ago, we realized an excursion to Ampelos all together, children and staff of the Facility. The route to Ampelos was fun, with music and cheerful mood. We stopped at some viewpoints and took pictures. When we arrived at Ampelos, we searched for the path leading to the waterfall, since it was our first time there. On the way, we were trying out wild fruits and some awfully sour tangerines and lemons that the children picked up from the ground, which, although they were impossible to eat (honestly!), some of the kids found them tasty.

The path was sometimes downhill, sometimes uphill, with ropes in different places, which gave us a sense of adventure. The highlight was when we arrived at a cave and the most daring of us walked inside.

While on the outside it seemed small, it had a substantial depth with several bifurcations. Inside, we saw bats hanging from the cave’s ceiling. I told the children to stay quiet so as not to wake them up, but exactly the opposite happened, resulting to the bats flying like mad in the cave, whilst we had fallen to the floor, trying to cover our heads. However, nobody panicked! We decided to get out of the cave and go back another day with better equipment for its exploration.

When we got to the waterfall, it had no water, but that gave us a chance to climb it. We all climbed on the top of the waterfall, which wasn’t particularly easy, and gave a touch of additional challenge in the last part of our journey.

We sat down to rest for a while and decided to go for a walk in Karlovassi. We relaxed in the town’s square and later on visited an old Byzantine church, for which children were particularly interested. On the way back the kids were characterized by peacefulness, were evidently tired, but all of them seemed glad with the beautiful day we spent together!”