From bailout to bailout

After covering the Spanish bailout, I fly from Madrid to Athens. In the taxi rank at Athens airport, iPhone wedged between ear and shoulder, I realise I have crossed both borders without showing my passport. Welcome to Schengenland — how long will it last? Reuters has just published a leak of EU contingency plans for a Greek exit: they involve suspending free movement under the Schengen Agreement, as well as imposing limits on ATM ­withdrawals and controls on cross-border movement of cash. Somebody texts me: ‘This is irresponsible — it could start a panic in Greece.’ But the Greeks are not flustered. Most of the hot money is long gone from the Greek system. What’s still left — though it’s shrinking by the day — is kept in there as a kind of hedge against unexpected survival.

On Wednesday, we take a long drive into the mountains of Thessaly.