Life, Love, and the Pursuit of Core Strength: Odyssey

Today we hiked to the Odysee crag, past all the walls we’ve already been to and further towards the little town of Kasteli. It sprinkled on us off and on and the wind has really picked up since previous days. There was a spectacular thunderstorm out at sea last night that we could watch from our balcony like fireworks. Since then the air is warmer, but the wind has been impressive. We stopped at this information center in Kasteli to pick up the free insert for the guidebook. Despite our guidebook being published in 2008, there has been such rampant route development, it is already outdated.

When I came back out of the info center, everyone was huddled around one of the roadside dumpsters. The woman from inside and I went out to see what James, Laurel, and Kenneth were all looking at under the dumpster and there they were: three kittens no older than a couple of days- only one trying to walk and he kept moving in the direction of the road. There was broken glass all around them and as the woman threw some of the bigger glass shards into the dumpster she tsked her tongue and said people throw away kittens often here.

We had definitely already noticed that there was a problem on the island with stray cats. Many restaurants have cats that sneak under tables for hopeful scraps. Now what was I to do? It was raining and blowing dirt and these kittens couldn’t even walk yet. Taking Greek kittens through customs obviously wouldn’t fly and it seemed cruel to try and take care of them and then leave eight days later. But I couldn’t just leave them by the road like that in the glass. Kenneth looked around for the off chance that there was a momma kitten nearby. I decided that I would at least take them with me for the day, keep them dry & warm, and if they died then at least they would be more comfortable then in their current condition.

Hiking up to the crag with three tiny kittens folded up in your shift is tricky because you don’t want to misstep and jostle the little things. They really liked the hike and quickly fell asleep in a fuzzy pile. We built them a nest at the crag (hello. . .NICU nurse. . .I think I can build a developmentally supportive nest) and fed them a couple drops of cream when they would wake up with a dismantled pen made dropper feeder.

Meanwhile, while the kittens were sleeping, I warmed up on some 11s and got on Orion (7c+)- used to be 8a and the crux felt quite difficult taking four tries to redpoint (twice as many goes on this route than any other this trip)! The route was alright, but not the quality of the ones from the previous days. I decided to give Gaia (8b) a go and got shut down by a long move that I simply couldn’t reach no matter what feet I tried. I did all of the other moves, but I don’t think I’ll be getting back on that one.

Okay, so back to the kittens. We hiked down from the crag with the plan to try and find a vet/shelter in Pothias in the morning (probably non-existent, but worth a try). As we reached the road, we decided to look around one last time for momma cats. We saw several cats this time and one slender cat that looked like she was interested in the kittens when I sat them down!!! She watched us from a distance until we were sure that she would not come to them while we were anywhere near. We decided that these kittens (island vet or not) were not going to survive without their mother and their best chance was to stay there. We left them in a sheltered spot with enough protection to keep them warm and dry and parted ways.

And now I’ve done nothing but worry about them all night. I fear that I did wrong taking them in the first place, but I was led to believe they were dumped. I fear that I did the wrong thing leaving them last night. Sigh. Kittens are so stressful!