Knossos

July 10, 2012

We left early, because we did not want to have a problem with the car…like getting a ticket or getting it towed.

Dada is our driver and she had driven about 30 minutes and said I am going to stop for coffee. She turns off the national highway and we arrive at the most picturesque village with a small harbor and a beach perched on a hillside. Very small. We walked to the end of the street and sat at a table, perched on the end of the cliff overlooking the ocean and had a coffee (the best of the trip so far) and a breakfast. It was a storybook village.

We drove east along the northern coast toward Heraklion to go to the Archeological Museum and then Knossos, a Minoan archeological site. We made it to the museum, which was under renovation so only a small gallery was open but it was a wonderful collection of very ancient artifacts, some from 6500 BC. Loved it. It was hot, but we walked to the port to check on tickets for a boat trip to Santarini. The cheap ferry for 18 Euros only goes once a week, but the tourist boat goes everyday but for 102 euros. Dada decided not to go, but I booked my ticket.

Then we spent most of the day looking for a small beach village to stay for a couple of nights, because I will be spending the entire day on Santarini, we wanted a nice place for Dada to hang out until I return. In the end we gave up, found a beach to take a swim and have a coffee, then decided to look for a place in Knossos, where we will be touring the following day.

We arrive in the Knossos and we cannot see a real village and drive a bit further and then we stop at an outdoor restaurant and ask the young punk rocker type guy. He was tall, dressed in low slung sweat pants and his head was shaved except for a strip on top that stood straight up maybe 3 inches and the ends were dyed blond. He also had an eyebrow piercing. He was very animated and told us where to go…he said, "It was easy."  I said, "Yes, easy for you! Could you come with us and show us?" He was reluctant so I asked him to draw me a map, so he wrote some directions down and promised to go with us if we could not find it on our own and came back. 

We got to the town and could not see anything, so we stopped and I hopped out and asked the person at the tourist kiosk. He said it is right up there on the hill, but no one is there, but I will call them for you. He was shockingly helpful. He takes out his cell phone and then hands it to me to make the deal for the night. I asked him if there was anywhere to get a coffee and he said his house, which happened to be next door to the house with the rooms. He had to close up his kiosk and then he got in our car and we drove the 100 meters up a steep hill into the village to his house. Manuel welcomed us in and it was beautifully designed, he had just moved back in after remodeling. It was and small stone home that he expanded with a living room and a loft for is bedroom. There was an inner courtyard off the kitchen and a terrace on the roof.  We sat in the inner courtyard and he made us a foamed, creamy, iced latte. His mother was there too, she pulled up a chair and made comments (without speaking) about how hot it was (apparently this will be the hottest week on record!). 

We talked for about 30 minutes, waiting for Maria, the hotel owner to arrive. He lives 5 months here during tourist season and then 7 months in Egypt. His home reflected this, with gorgeous light fixtures handmade from Egypt. He gave such beautiful opinions on life and he lived to travel. He had strong opinions and I found that I agreed with him. He is angry and hurt that the world has a wrong opinion of Greeks as lazy and do not want to work. Maria arrived and she was equally charming, the room is small, but clean and equipped with a kitchen.

As it was 9 pm by then, we decided to return to the punk rockers restaurant. The mother and son were delighted to see us, we were the only ones in this large open-air place. A bit later a couple of their relatives and friends showed up.  So began a long evening of conversation on the philosophy of life, comparisons of people’s cultures, stories of world travel and explanations of how the Greek live and think. The food was delicious and I had my usual Greek salad. We arrived at 9 pm and left after midnight.

Fort in Rethymno, Crete, Greece

Reythymno, Crete, Greece

July 9, 2012

I am sitting on my terrace in the old city of Reythymno. When you travel so many things happen in a day…today we left Kissamos by bus after a lovely breakfast (Greek Omelet) and a Greek coffee in the town square by the small church. It must be a very small town because after three nights I am already recognizing people. We transferred busses in Chania for a 30-minute bus ride to the airport to get our car. Everything went smooth and the rental people were very talkative and I used this to ask questions I have about Greece and the current situation. It was really fun. We hopped in our nearly new car and were giddy with the new freedom of being able to stop wherever we wanted. Our first stop was to have coffee and it overlooked a stunning beach. After we finished our snack, Dada had meatballs and I had a fennel pie, we decided to try and find our way down to this beach. It took us about 20 minutes but we finally found the way down and had a wonderful swim with the other 15 people who were on this fairly remote beach.

We finally made it to Rethhymno and walked in the old city discovering a superbly preserved fort, Venetian, with a beautiful Mosque inside the fort. It was designed to hold the whole city when they were under attack. The city has Turkish influences, with the wonderful wooden houses that overhang on the second floor, which I saw in Turkey and well as other Venetian homes. By then it was 7 pm and I did not want to not have a place when it gets dark so I saw a sign “rooms” and asked, no vacancies, I asked for a recommendation, she said go to the bookstore around the corner, sometimes they have rooms, so we went there and again no vacancies. I asked my same question about a recommendation and the woman sent us around the corner to a house that had a hand written sign “rooms”. The woman who answered the doorbell was 30ish and very charming and happy. She was pleased to engage in conversation about Greece. She told me she was an X-ray technician and she used to be paid 1000 euros a month, but now only gets 500 euros because her salary was cut by ½. She hates the way the Greek people are being portrayed in the media. And she thinks the politicians are corrupt.

The room was lovely on the third floor with a large terrace. We got our things up to the room, found a free and safe place to park the car and wandered the harbor and the old city, then had dinner. I had my usual Greek Salad. I think I could eat this every night. 

Ancient City Wall

Kissamos

Kissamos

I wanted to tell a story of a religious man I saw in the bus station. He was a Greek Orthodox priest I think. He was dressed in a dark blue long robe that buttoned in the front. It went to the floor and was long sleeved. It flowed beautifully when he walked. He had a long beard and was wearing a tall hat the was the shape of a giant water bottle cap, with a thin doughnut ring around the top. (I wish I could have taken his picture, but as with many things when you travel, sometime you cannot take a photo and still be respectful.) His “headquarters” was a table in the bus station, like all the other tables. This was clearly his “office”. He had his cold drink, a jumble of papers and most of the time was calmly sitting there with a wooden cross in one hand and a small playing card size photo of a saint in the other hand. He was holding them up for all to see. Several times during the 30 minutes I was in the bus station he patrolled around holding his religious symbols. Once I saw him go up to two young backpacker types and start talking to them. They did not speak Greek , but the priest kept talking and finally gently touched the cross to each of their foreheads and walked away.

Today, we had big plans to leave Kissamos, but we kept coming up with different ideas of what to do next. Like, should we rent a car, take the bus, go to Santarini (another island), go north, go east….we discussed many options. We decided to go have a coffee and walk around the town. I had seen some signs of the roman ruins, so we saw a small part of the ancient village wall, this village had an inner and outer wall. Then we found the ruins of a Roman urban home with a mosaic floor. We saw another sign for Polyrinna, that pointed up a road so we started walking….we didn’t know how far it was or even what it was, just that it was a historical site. After climbing up an inclined road we stopped in a shady spot to assess the situation. Just then a man in a truck was driving by and he stopped and said, “Polyrinna?”... the name of the historical site as a question. We said yes. He moved some things around and offered us a place in the back of his truck. He had the two Polish tourists, who were also walking up the road, on the inside of the truck. So off we went, up and up and up until we were 5 miles up this road. It was a fabulous ride, with spectacular views and the wind was blowing so it was refreshing, but most of all it felt like a real adventure. I loved it. Little did we know it was this far. So this place is an ancient village (still occupied) built into the side of the mountain. There was an operating Roman aqueduct and lots of ruins of small stone houses, plus some of these stone houses that were occupied had signs of modern life, like loud music playing. It was a climb up to the site and houses were perched on the hillside. It was very hot and nearly no shade, but fascinating. We walked around the ruins for a couple of hours then made our descent. We learned that there was no bus to get back, and we asked all of the other tourists who were there for a ride, but no one said yes. So we decided to hitchhike and/or walk and depend on the generosity of the Greek people. We started down the road and in 15 minutes only two cars came by…finally a Greek family, on their way to the brothers house stopped, rearranged the children and the car seat and drove us down, chatting all the way.

Chania, Crete, Greece