Got pulled over by the Greek police this morning

We were about half an hour outside of Kalamata on our way to Mystras and then Sparta, driving through the mountains, when we encountered a bicyclist coming down the road in the opposite direction.  We didn't think much of it.  We had seen a couple of other bicyclists when we were driving from Delphi to Dodona.  Then, we saw another.  And then there a car that had some labeling for "organization".  What merely a couple of bicycles, we now thought was some kind of Greek training run for the qualifying events of the Olympics.

There were more official cars, a couple of police on motorcycles, another bicyclist which we graciously let pass on our side of the road as there was road construction on his...  We even passed a police car sitting on the side of the road with its lights on.  Further up in the mountains eventually there were a pair of police on motorcycles coming in the other direction, and one of them motioned for us to pull over, which we did, gladly.  We were confused, and no one had stopped our progress.

The officer started in Greek, so we just said "hello" which has been our way of saying "please, do you speak English?"  Immediately, he switched, and told us that a bicycle race was coming towards us and that we had about half a kilometer to go up the road and pull off.  He also told us to wait until the 100 or so bicyclists past and that there would be an ambulance and a bus to indicate the end of the racers.

Well, as I was navigator, I realized we were at the bottom of a series of three hairpin turns, and with the clock ticking, I told Randall to keep driving up.  We got past the second, and found a great chromatodromos ("dirt road"--more about those shortly), did a quick 5 point turn around, and got out of the car to watch from the side of the road.

Ever wait for a bicycle race that your weren't expecting?  I mean, I knew the torch was long gone out of Greece by now, but I was not expecting to have to avoid a 6-day race just around the Peloponnese.

Over the course of about 10 minutes, there were more official cars, more mopeds, more police, media.  We dutifully waved to everyone, and they waved back.  Then, you could hear the distinct whirring of wheels and gears from the roads above, and then about 50 cyclists whizzed past us in a blur.  But remember, the officer distinctly said about 100+.  So we waited another few minutes.  A few more cars and mopeds and media, and then another 50 cyclists and an ambulance and a big media van.

And then silence.  We decided to wait for a few solid minutes more just to make sure, and sure enough, there were a couple of trailers.  We waved to them as well, and one actually said "hello" back.  Still no bus.  We waited fully another 15 minutes as we kept inspecting the quality of the cars--whether they were official or merely travelers like us.  After about the third questionable car, we decided that the van must have been the bus, and started back up the road.  As we got into the long stretch after the last hairpin of this ascent, we saw the bus escorted by the police car, and waved.  They waved back.