In the steps of Homer

By VALERIE HELPS

I am standing in a cave near Lefkas, known also as Lefkada, south of Corfu. Once an island, it is now connected to the mainland of Greece by a causeway created by the gradual silting up of the narrow sea passage.

A nearby cape has for centuries been known as Cape Skilla and the adventurer-author Tim Severin in his book The Ulysses Voyage believes that the cave here might well have been Scylla's Lair in Homer's Odyssey. It is now a chapel to St Anthony as, with the advent of Christianity, pagan places of worship were all rededicated to some acceptable, known saint.

The chapel is in the cave halfway up the steep slopes of a spider-infested mountain which has been known, also since ancient times, as Mt Lamia (mountain of the long-necked devouring monster). As I am not too partial to spiders, my companion offered to go ahead with a stick breaking down the sparkling early morning webs which were indeed most beautiful but also indescribably adhesive.

Thick layers of dew-heavy branches hung across the short, steep path which wound its way up the mountain - which is really a hill rather than a mountain, but Homer made a habit of exaggerating mountains, streams and palaces, or perhaps they were considered larger-than-life in his day.

We were cool and damp by the time we reached our objective which was approached across a narrow, roofed terrace jutting over the hillside and supporting an outsize cross which I had noticed from the road. A large bell hung from a metal beam.

Fat, round spiders sat in diaphanous webs that festooned the wooden beams and I thought wryly that this ancient place may have been dangerous for Bronze Age galleons but today's spider-ridden chapel could be equally alarming for arachnophobics.

A wreath of dried flowers and grasses hung above the wooden door - a legacy from the first of May celebrations most likely. The hillside was still in deep shadow and the atmosphere quite spooky though the bright early morning sun on the lagoons and reedy water-ways below was spectacular in contrast to the gloom of the cave.

We opened the door with the large rusty key hanging on a nail and stepped inside the odiferous cave and waited for our eyes to become accustomed to the gloom.

The accumulated stench of centuries of mould and candle-grease and human sweat was quite overpowering - the chapel is still a cave with rough and pitted walls gouged out of the hillside, nothing has been done to alter it in any way.

It is small - Severin says the highest point was 4.5m, it was 3.5m deep and some 9m wide. Faded frescos of saints line the uneven surfaces - icons hang from rusty nails including one of St George and the dragon which one sees in every Christian church and chapel throughout Greece.

I could not wait to get out of the evil cave - not only was it physically repulsive, I sensed something deeper, something threatening in the atmosphere. Was it the presence of centuries of fear leaving an imprint on the landscape? I only know I was glad to escape into the daylight.

It was easy to see from here how the narrow channel, as it once was, between the island and the mainland, could have created a whirlpool with the converging tides flowing from both sides of the island.

But looking seawards across the silted-up channel there were no whirlpools or monsters, just a calm morning light over the 3.2km-long reef known as Plaka Spit which is only 30cm or so above sea-level and ends in a tiny atoll.

Down below the road to Lefkas ran past the silted up lagoon which lay in swirling patterns of reeds and marshland where fishermen catch eels in large quantities.

Later I stood on the Siren's Beach at the tip of nearby Yrapetra Point. It was easy to imagine their seductive voices drifting across the waves - but Ulysses had been warned and he instructed his crew to tie him to the mast, having first stuffed up their ears with wax so they could not hear the voices.

We found Lefkas to be a lively place well supplied with tavernas and eating places along the promenade which faces a placid lagoon and yacht basin.

The island is rugged, rising to a central range; the eastern side heavily forested while the western slopes are barren and wind-scarred as they plunge steeply into ravines and fiords. Cattle have right of way and donkeys are still a means of slow transport.

On our final day we drove to the southern end of the island to Vasiliki, a quiet and charming resort where, after a picnic beneath an olive tree, we had our first swim in the warm Ionian Sea - a magical end to our holiday.