Greece: Day 10

Location: Athens

The Acropolis was open today!

The Parthenon:

The Erechtheion

The Theater of Dionysus

The Temple of Hephaestus

Church of the Holy Apostles

I have to thank Glenn for forcing me to sit through that documentary about how ancient architects built the Parthenon, as it gave me a healthy appreciation for the effort that went into building this incredible structure. Alexis and I also walked through the National Gardens and the Ancient Agora, and we watched the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Alexis and I cautiously discussed with each other that we may have enjoyed the Ancient Agora and the accompanying museum in the Stoa of Attalos even more than the Acropolis. It’s one thing to see where people worshipped, but it’s far more interesting (to me) to see how they lived. The museum was filled with items like dishes, cookware, jewelry, and other pieces recovered around Athens (for really, people dig this stuff up in their backyards) that ancient people used in their day-to-day lives. There were also water clocks and the device by which ancient Greeks selected juries for cases. And oh my god, the sculptures!

One piece of the exhibit were the ostraka from Greek assembly votes (our word ostracism comes from this word ostraka); they are pieces of broken pottery on which members of the assembly wrote the name of the politician they least liked, and if a politician received over 6,000 votes, he was exiled from Athens for ten years (a sort of negative vote). Themistocles appears to have been particularly unpopula

As neither Alexis nor I could stomach any more Greek food, we were delighted to locate a greasy Chinese place. We spent the rest of the afternoon shopping; we loved looking at the pretty European lingerie and we had a ball putting together outfits for each other in H&M. We had Italian for dinner.

Greece: Day 9

Location: Matala/Athens

I wanted to paddle the last leg from Agia Galini back to Matala this morning, but I worried my poor stomach just couldn’t take eight miles on open water. Instead Alexis and I were drove to Matala, where we used the time the others were kayaking to take a last walk around the town, the beach, and the caves. This extra time proved highly useful as Alexis and I had planned to take the ferry back to the main part of the country, and the ferries surprised us by announcing a strike; we had to scramble to book last-minute plane tickets to Athens, which cost a fortune since the only tickets left were business class.

The silver lining is that I got to experience travelling business class; the flight from Heraklion to Athens is only about 35 minutes, but we got newspapers, hot towels, alcohol, and really nice sandwiches.

Alexis and I got a room in a hostel in Athens where we stashed our stuff, and then we went out to do the city thing. Unfortuately, it was about four by the time we got started, and we found that most of the attractions close around five, so I basically showed Alexis around what I knew of Athens (Monistiraki, Syntagma Square), we did gyros for dinner and ice cream for dessert, and Alexis went to bed early while I checked out the rooftop bar of our hostel (deserted).  I chatted with my friends back home for a few hours and then went to bed as well.

Our hostel is such a change from the hotels we’ve been staying at. It’s a lot more like my cabin on the ferry than a hotel room (bunk beds, a shower, a toilet, and a folding chair), and the view outside is of the backside of another building, some climate control machines, and someone’s shoe lying on a shack. I like this place.

The Greek Capital Building, unusually free of protestors.

Greece: Day 8

Location: Agia Galini

Today was a bad day; I chose not to kayak in the morning, mortified as I still was from the vomiting incident, so Alexis and I rode in the van to our lunch destination, called Palm Beach. We got there early enough that I got some hiking in while Alexis relaxed on the beach. Palm Beach actually has a Greek name, but everyone calls it Palm Beach because there is a palm forest just inland from the coast. Hiking through the palm forest was amazing; I’ve never seen terrain or foliage like that – I wish I hadn’t forgotten my camera in the van!

Here is why it was a bad day: in the isolation of the palm forest, a man overtook me and did things to me before letting me go – not that, but enough to make me feel helpless and degraded. I sobbed to Alexis on the beach and didn’t eat lunch. I was feeling blue enough to spend the rest of the day moping in the van, but as I watched all the people prepping to kayak to Agia Galini, I felt the urge to do something, anything, so that getting touched by a stranger in a forest was not the most remarkable part of my day. So I hopped in a kayak.

Paddling turned out to be quite an adventure when the winds picked up (a steady 15 mph, with sudden long gusts at 25 mph). The rough water took my mind off my bruised feelings and churning stomach, and I was able to make it the whole way without incident (I told myself, “You don’t have time to think or to throw up, you’ll tip over or be blown out to sea!”). I also managed to land and launch my own boat, and jump in while it was floating in the water. Looking back I can remember this with pride, as a counterpoint to this morning’s incident. It set me on the right tracks for a good rest of the day.

Tonight is our last night as a group, and the hotel is swank-eehhh. There’s a shower curtain, and the water can reach tolerable temperatures between scalding hot and Arctic-cold. A lot of the hotels we’ve been in just have an area of the bathroom with a drain in it, and you can only tell it’s a shower by the spigot and the attached sprayer on the wall; you just have to hold it over your head and wash with one hand. Another weird thing about Greek bathrooms: you can’t flush toilet paper; instead you have to put it in the wastebasket provided. At the beginning of the week, I felt this was extremely gross, but I’ve grown to not think about it, and I can remember to throw the TP away about 75% of the time.

I just got back from dinner (prawns in garlic and barracuda). There is talk of going to a nightclub, although I’ve had a long day.

Greece: Day 7

Location: Hora Sfakia/Plakias

Today I threw up. We launched our kayaks and were planning on paddling to Hora Sfakia, whereafter we would drive to the ruins of the Venetian fortress at Frangokastello. Devon and I shared a kayak, so I had a witness as I became increasingly seasick; I was holding it together until another woman threw up, which broke me, and we had to make an early stop to get out of the boats. We rode in the van to Hora Sfakia (where I saw a Toyota Hilux in person!) and then onto Frangokastello, the most spectacular part of which was an art gallery in the one standing building showcasing the traditional Cretan art of lace-making. The intricacy and complexity of patterns in these little bits of woven thread were astonishing.

I was a bit wary of getting back in the boat after humiliating myself, so I chose to van it to Plakias while I made sure my stomach wasn’t going to act up again; Alexis also suffered from sea sickness, so I had a friend at least. In Plakias, we took advantage of a brief appearance of the sun to put on our bikinis and “sunbathe,” although we ended up goofing off trying to imitate poses we’ve seen on Maxim covers. 

This hotel is my favorite one yet; it looks like the architect was M.C. Escher – there are staircases everywhere, and the doors are in no particular order. Our room number is 307, but we’re between 205 and 310. Just down the walkway is room 105. All of these rooms are on the same level. Alexis and I also had fun trying to interpret the air conditioner in our room, which boasted “five ways,” each of which corresponded to a button on the machine; the buttons featured the following icons: a frog over the letters STD, a laughing baby, a boat going very fast, a skull with a lightning bolt through its forehead, and Hitler. We had the AC on laughing baby mode while we stayed there, as it seemed most pleasant. It had to be far better than lightning-bolt-skull mode or Hitler mode.

Plakias is a very touristy town, full of crappy souvenir shops; still, they’re fun to look in, and I was able to pick up some joke-y souvenirs for friends (a shotglass with Crete written on?) as well as an olivewood bowl for myself before I realized what a horrible mistake I’d made, as I now have to figure out how to pack a bowl in my small suitcase. The shop owner I bought the bowl from asked me, “Why are you so white?” I stared at him, shocked; I didn’t really know if he wanted me to describe my ancestry for him, and I was curious if this was some sort of quirky sales pitch. He clarified, saying, “Haven’t you been to the beach?” I resented this somewhat, as Alexis is just as pale as me, but no one was asking her about it. I said, “I wear a lot of sunscreen!” Still, I bought a bowl from the guy, so maybe it was a sales pitch.

Greece: Day 6

Location: Loutro, Anopolis

I saw dawn today, as I was up early to do another hike; this time, I would be exploring Aradena Gorge with Ryan. The most strenuous part of the trip came first, scaling the hills that ring the coast of Crete, which required a good deal of steep switch-backing. At the top of the path there was an old monastery with a terrific 360-degree view; this allowed me my first true view of the interior of Crete (we have been travelling around the coast for the most part), which is a vast valley of farmland and little towns. We headed into Anopolis, where we got some breakfast. Anopolis felt the most genuine of all the places we’d been so far, and as such, I remember it fondly and clearly. I have no pictures of Anopolis; it was the first place I’d been to where I felt that taking photographs would be an invasion of privacy.

Aradena Gorge was, in truth, a lot more fun than Samaria. The trails are a bit less worn-in and there are a lot fewer people; Ryan and I did not spot a single soul until the very end of the hike, where some visitors from Marmara Beach were exploring the mouth of the canyon (we started at the top of the canyon and walked down). Once again, the hike reminded me forcibly of Colorado.

We ran into Leslie and Seth at Marmara, and we all had lunch together (cheese pie with honey for me), after which Ryan fell asleep with his head in his arms on the table. We collected beer bottles from the other restaurant patrons, arranged them around Ryan, and took a couple of pictures for posterity (and blackmail material) before he woke up, after which we left for the beach. Ryan fell asleep again on a beach chair, Seth and Leslie did some cliff-diving (I didn’t participate because I did not want to get wet), and then the three of us left Ryan to kayak back to Loutro; this was a great way to end the day, as I thought I was going to have to hike back to Loutro and not get any kayaking in at all.

Greece: Day 5

Location: Loutro/Agia Roumeli

Awoke to the sound of Coco, the African Grey parrot that belongs to the owner of the hotel we’re staying at, meowing this morning. He sits on top of his cage and hoots and whistles at the people who walk by. He has both English and Greek words.

Today was the day of my hard-won Samaria Gorge trip. After Ben, one of the guides, cautioned us repeatedly to return exactly at or preferably before five in the evening, we had five hours to ourselves. It was a nice little hike; it’s about two kilometers to walk to the entrance of the gorge, and then Lynn, Alexis, and I managed to get six kilometers in, close to halfway, before we had to turn around due to time constraints. It was a nice hike, with periodic water stops, some really cool ruins, and donkeys tied to posts (the park rangers there ride donkeys).

The weirdest thing about the gorge was that, once you got far enough away from the ocean, it was exactly like walking around in Colorado. The foliage was slightly different here and there, but it was uncanny. I even asked the other Coloradoans here about it, and they said they’d been thinking the same thing. Weird to find a bit of home in Greece.

Dinner was probably the best we’d had all week; I got lamb and Alexis got chicken, so we could share. The biggest event of the evening were the anti-austerity fire-bombings in Athens; all the locals have been glued to their TV sets. It’s a little weird vacationing in a place that’s up in arms against its government; I feel bad that these people must be worried about their friends and family in Athens, and we’re expecting them to act friendly and serve us delicious roasted meats.

The owner himself (Pavlos) served his home-brewed raki, called Pavlos Raki. I even got a picture with him.