Thursday 21/10 was the second free day in the canyoning meeting but very few canyoners stayed out of the canyons. The weather continued to be awesome and sunny, so most of them went for a swim at the beach, enjoying and relaxing.
Since this canyoning meeting is in Ierapetra I decided to go on a completely different place: Takis Shelter www.takisshelter.org – https://www.facebook.com/TakisShelterCrete with more than 800.000 followers from all over the world. There I had the opportunity to meet Takis and make a small donation on behalf of www.canyoning.ai and my family but also play with the dogs, the cats and the single little lamb of the gang, at the shelter.
The place was very good organized, extremely clean for hosting so many animals, all the dogs were happy to see the visitors and interacted playfully. The cats were also very social and didn’t hesitate to come for cuddles and snacks.
Takis is a very simple and friendly man, who has dedicated his life to his shelter. His most beloved old dog is “Grioula” (Little Old Lady in Greek) and she sleeps (among other old dogs) on his bed with him every night. Volunteers visit and stay in this shelter with a waiting list (I was informed that end of January is the first available opening). Canyoning is about compassion, so if you got inspired from Taki’s story think about adopting a dog or a cat rather than buying.
Well, compassion day at RIC2020CRETE continued with the successful rescue of a small goat that was wondering around in the canyon Kavousi II. When my team passed the spot where she was seen last we could not approach her and I was very sad… but thankfully some other canyoning friends managed to catch her and get her out of the canyon otherwise she would have died, not being able to find an exit.
Compassion day had one more mission, with Yanni’s Bromirakis successful attempt to catch and carry with safety an injured Cretan eagle found in Lapathos canyon. The bird had a broken wing and could not fly but also was very frightened. As it was struggling to fly made it very difficult for Yanni to wrap his wings and ty them, so he could get the wild eagle out of the canyon and bring it to a local bird shelter to heal in safety.
