*By Dimitris Kyriazis
From Sepolia to Tripoli and the Mainalo refuge, Aris Giannoukos recounts his 20-year journey away from the capital and how he found spiritual peace, less stress and a clear mind in the mountains.
Aris Giannoukos is a “veteran” of decentralization. He was born and raised in Sepolia and, like his famous fellow countryman, Giannis Antetokounmpo, managed to live his dream after many years of hard work.
What was Aris’ dream? Of course, the mountain. And not just any mountain, but Mainalo. Having family roots in Arcadia and visiting the area on all his vacations, he made the decision and the risk to leave Athens and his job on the seventh floor of a windowless building to try life in the countryside.
Twenty years and a lot of hard work later, he managed to make his hobby a profession. He essentially lives off the mountain, which for him is, as he told us, the medicine and the secret of his success. In our conversation, he explained his decision and described how his life has evolved so far.
Most visitors to the mountain refuge are from Athens. What I advise them is to make a plan B for escaping Athens and returning to the countryside and nature.
“I was born in Athens in 1979, I lived and grew up in Sepolia – Antetokounmpo and I – until 2005 when I decided to leave for Tripoli. I had roots from Arcadia and I often visited Tripoli, since my grandparents lived there. In the summers, Easter, Christmas, I always spent my holidays there.
So, at the age of 26, I decided to stay in the city permanently. I started working as a salesperson in a sportswear store. In Athens, I was the store manager for a well-known sportswear brand, in Piraeus. On the 7th floor, without windows and with hours from 9:00-21:00, a twelve-hour day. Then I also had the daily trip from Sepolia to Piraeus. So, a total of 14 hours. What was left? Ten hours to see friends and sleep.
A blessed friend from Tripoli threw me the spark of fleeing Athens one night, accompanied by tsipouros. He asked me how I was doing in Athens and what my daily life was like in the capital. It was the holiday season, the Epiphany in particular. When I told him about my daily life, he was surprised and asked me how I could stand this routine. This reaction troubled me.
Five months later, he called me and told me that they were looking for a salesperson in a sportswear store in Tripoli. So, I decided, after consulting my parents, friends, and my then-girlfriend and now-wife, to go for a year to try out life in a provincial city like Tripoli and if I didn’t like it, to come back. I had nothing to lose, I said. Basically, everyone encouraged me to pack up and leave. The routine of Athens had begun to become tiring and soul-destroying.
Another, very basic reason that led me to the decision to leave Athens and move away was my love for the mountains. Every weekend I would disappear, for mountaineering, climbing and generally wherever I could be in contact with nature. With the idea of charging our batteries and spending the coming week in the capital. Tripoli was therefore the ideal case, since it is located at the foot of Mainalos. In ten minutes from the city, you are in vast forests of Kefalonian fir.
I remember, when I went to work in Tripoli on my first day, I could get there in three minutes by bike. Also, the shops in Tripoli did not have continuous opening hours, like in Athens, so I realized what free time means. And free time shapes the quality of our lives. So, I dedicated my free time to the mountains. Mountaineering, climbing, cycling and excursions, since we have so much beauty around us. Almost twenty years later, in the last period I have managed to make my hobby a profession and thank God I manage to support my family. I manage the Mainalo mountain refuge and accompany groups on the mountain trails, as a mountain guide. After this journey that I told you about, I now maintain a healthy business far from civilization – as the nearest village is ten kilometers away – on a mountain that I love.
The Mainalo mountain refuge “Panos Alexopoulos” is located on the Ostrakina plateau, at an altitude of 1600m, next to the ski center and below the highest peak of the mountain, Ostrakina (Prophet Elias), with an altitude of 1,981m. It was built in 1969, belongs to the Greek Mountaineering Association (EOS) of Tripoli and I have taken over its management for three years.
The refuge can accommodate up to 40 people and also provides food, coffee, etc. services. It is open all weekends of the year and also weekdays by arrangement.
One of the strong features of the refuge is that it is the starting point of many trails to the surrounding peaks and to all the villages around it, namely Vytina, Vlacherna, Levidi, Kardara, Alonistaina. The Mainalo mountain range currently has over 300 km. of marked trails, most of which are drowned in forests of Kefalonian fir.
In addition to the trails, in the surrounding area we also organize other sports activities, such as mountain biking, climbing, horseback riding, rafting, kayaking on the Lousios River, canyoning and whatever else comes our way. The mountain is crazy and requires energy.
My wife, who has supported me unimaginably throughout this journey, is also from Athens. 2008 came. For three years, she only went back and forth between Athens and Tripoli on weekends, as she was also working. And yet, we had a great time, since in Athens we spent three or four days meeting up with my schedule anyway. Not everything was rosy along the way and times are even more difficult now. Of the twenty years that I have been in Arcadia, ten of them I worked two jobs. That is, seven days a week. There were no holidays, celebrations, and such. Simply put, the second job was always in the mountains.
The mountains are the medicine and the secret of success for me. They give you incredible peace of mind, less stress and a clear mind for making the right and logical decisions in your life. But we have to be restless and, if necessary, take some risks, if we want the quality of our lives to change. It’s not just about money and career. Our freedom is becoming more and more limited over the years.
At the mountain refuge, most visitors are from Athens. What I advise them is to make a plan B for escaping Athens and returning to the countryside and nature. It’s not easy, I know. But the majority of people I meet are depressed, psychologically and physically. They have completely forgotten about nature. I tell them that the math doesn’t work. When there are about ten million of us in Greece and five of them live in Athens, where do we think they will fit in? Something is not working. Unfortunately, the government policies, which should mainly encourage young people to return and try in the countryside, are not helping either.
If I had the opportunity to change anything, it would be to have started my professional involvement in alternative tourism at a younger age. I reached the age of 43 to achieve it. Of course, to get where I am now, I set goals and achieved them, with years of patience and perseverance. I remember when I was 26 years old, when we used to go to the mountain refuge in Mainalo with friends and fellow travelers from EOS Tripoli, I always said how great it would be to be a guard of a mountain refuge and to be able to make your hobby a profession and live from it. It took me 15 years in the end, but I managed it.
At no point in my life, in all the years I have been here, have I regretted my choice and, as I told you, I have gone through difficult years, not everything was perfect. Let me give you an example. When sometimes we have to go to Athens for work or to see our relatives, after two days of staying we feel like we are locked in a cage. A friend once asked me, if you found a job with 3,000 euros a month, would you go back to Athens? The answer was clearly no, without a second thought.
When we start the return trip to Tripoli from Athens, we think we are going on an excursion somewhere. With this I want to tell you that we have not stopped appreciating – perhaps even appreciating even more – what we have around us, even though years have passed since we left Athens: the trees, our way of getting around the city, our garden, nature and much more. Of course, the most important thing of all is how much better it is for your children to grow up in a provincial town, close to the mountains and nature. They are freer.”
Source: lifo.gr
