The olive harvest years · Vathi, Kissamos

How the olive harvest used to be done in our villages — with beating sticks, nets, animals loaded for the olive press, and the first bread dipped in fresh oil.

If there was one task that set the rhythm of the year in Vathi, as in every village of Kissamos, it was the olive harvest. From November to January, when the olives turned black on the branches, the whole village lived in the groves. These were the years our grandparents knew, when the village was still called Kouneni.

Dawn in the olive grove

The day began before sunrise. Under each tree they spread the nets, large cloths to catch the falling fruit. The men climbed the trees or struck the branches with long sticks, and the olives fell like hail. The women and children gathered by hand, one by one, those that rolled off the nets onto the earth, their fingers frozen in the morning damp.

It was work for everyone. Families helped one another, and whoever finished their own olives went to lend a hand to the neighbour.

Fresh green olives gathered on the nets under an olive tree — Olives gathered on the nets — November

A meal under the olive tree

At midday a fire was lit from dry branches. Bread, olives, cheese, a little wine or raki against the cold, and whatever else each had brought in their bag. The food was simple, but the conversation lasted longer than the owner of the field would have liked.

From the field to the press

In the afternoon the olives were cleaned of leaves and poured into sacks. These were loaded onto mules and donkeys and carried up the paths to the olive press. There, in the old days, stone millstones crushed the fruit and presses squeezed the paste until the oil ran.

Two full sacks of olives in the grove, with the mountain behind — The sacks full, ready for the olive press — November

The greatest reward was the simplest: a slice of bread dipped in fresh oil, green and peppery, smelling of the grove itself. That oil would feed the family for the whole year to come.

Your memories

Much has changed today: the sticks became mechanical harvesters, the animals became farm trucks, and the old stone presses have closed. But the groves are still there, and every winter they fill with people again.

Do you remember the olive harvest in Vathi? Which olive press worked in the village or nearby? Who worked together? Do you have a photograph? If you would like to share it, write to me and I will add it here, with your name.