6/28/11 - 6/29/11
This morning there was the addition of nectarine for breakfast & I tried "mountain tea", which seems to consist of some blend of sage & mint. Unfortunately the receptionist had less information about how we can get to Archanes than Knossos, so we set off toward Iraklio, with the bus driver giving me helpful directions (to my -- let's be fair -- extremely clumsy queries) along the lines of "At the station. You'll know at the station." It could be that I just didn't know enough words to understand the specifics,
and I CERTAINLY didn't understand enough for the specifics of declensions, just sayin'
because the bus to Archanes WAS at a station -- just a different one from the transit center we were used to, which was apparently limited to Iraklio urban lines.
It's the Astoria Capsis station.
To get to Archanes we had to walk to the Minoan Lines terminal by the coast and take a giant green bus from there. Like Knossos, downtown Archanes was our last stop, so the overall navigation wasn't bad at all. There was more of an element of adventure this time though, since we had no map of the place, and though Annie tried to convince me that it's fine to explore a small town like Arhanes on foot without maps without getting lost, I'm afraid the idea conflicted with my control-freak tendencies. (She reminded me that we're in the Mediterraneans, and so should embrace the que sera sera attitude, to which I remarked, after hearing her descriptions of the various places that she'd been to, that perhaps I'm more suited for Germany.)
Due to unfortunate timing, the museum at Archanes was closed (and I learned later that evening that the reason the Archaeological Museum at Iraklio was small was because it was undergoing a 21 million euros reconstruction and we were only seeing 400 out of the ~ 15000 pieces usually on display -- though all the most famous exhibits were there, so that was not a total loss) and the utter confusion of signs (maybe there was an invisible one we missed somewhere?) meant that we were not able to find the archaeological site of Fourni, either. Our adventure toward the quest of the latter led us well outside of Archanes, through a very pretty area of olive groves and vineyards, before depositing us in a residential area where the stray dogs (and there were many of these during our stay in Greece) looked upon us with a sort of bemused curiosity.
Arhanes itself is referred to, by both the receptionist and my tour book (Lonely Planet), as a more traditional Greek village. Our hotel receptionist referred to as as being less touristy as well. We were lured into a bakery by the smell on one of the main streets and decided to forgo our packed lunches in favor of (very good) Greek pastries
and Annie was thanked in French because we were obviously foreigners, even if our--and by our I meant mostly Annie, since I think my ethnicity is not what most Europeans are prepared to cope with in terms of language barriers -- origins are uncertain. Apparently though the current generation tends to speak English as a second language, the older generation favored French.
and, later, following our hot but futile trek toward what we thought was Fourni, ice cream. Greek ice cream is very like Russian (or was that Armenian? It's been a while) ice cream. We decided to head back after that and to spend the rest of our day exploring Iraklio.
and so ended our foray to Archanes. It was a nice break since it was a quieter place than Iraklio. Of course Iraklio paled in comparison to the swarming at Athens that is a compounded side-effect of rioting and peaking of tourist season.
From the bus terminal in Iraklio we went past the Venetian Arches again and visited the Natural History Museum. The visit was, once again, a bit rushed because it closed at 4. (This sort of hours is apparently a common theme in these regions.) There was a "mini-zoo" on the bottom level of the museum, featuring a series of terrariums and aquariums, that was very cool. We followed the curves of the road inland after that and located St. Minas Cathedral, at Ekaterinis Square, which is the most amazing structure I've seen in Greece at this point. The number of icons decorating the beams and ceilings and the intricate details to every carved surface was fantastic.
We took a break by having gelato in front of the Mussolini fountain at that point, where we lingered and watched pigeon mating behavior.
Though I have heard of the phrase "puffed up like pigeon" before, and know what it refers to, I've never actually seen the behavior before and so ended up asking Annie, rather naively, what's wrong with that poor bird and why is it all puffed up and walking in circles.
I'm afraid I amused Annie a lot on this trip with the gaping wholes in my awareness, even before the thing with the oil lamp.
June is, apparently, the season of romance in Pigeon Land in these climates. Or possibly the season of heart break, if the number of rebuffs we witness was anything to go by (honestly, we were starting to feel sorry for that poor guy). Despite of my apparent location, eating lemoni gelato while watching pigeon in front a Venetian fountain felt very Italian. Possibly even more so than the guests at that table being serenaded by the men with accordions that we passed by earlier.
Eventually, with packing for tomorrow's 9:30am flight in mind, we wandered back to the transit center via Didoukou St.
Read: tourist trap.
Evening was spent packing and email checking -- Annie found out that there will be a strike tomorrow morning at the airport, so that should be interesting. We ate our packed lunch for dinner and packed lunch for the next day, to plan accordingly. It was time to sleep by the time everything was wrapped up.
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