It's All Greek To Me!!

Well, yesterday, on father's day, Bill and I had a sad departure at the Budapest Airport. He went home with Ken and Nancy, and Ricky and I, at the same time they were leaving, flew to Athens. I wish he could have come with us but he has to go to camp pitch and campmeeting. Tomorrow will be our 35th wedding anniversary. I guess we celebrated it for the past two weeks. And we had a wonderful time.

Athens was a pretty spectacular scene from the air. It was very clear flying in and the tourquoise water and brown mountains were quite a contrast. You couldn't help but notice how brown things looked. The brown is heavily dotted with flowering bushes and plants however. All in all it kind of has a Phoenix look to the landscape, without the ocean.

We caught a bus at the airport that took us to the port of Pireus where our boat would be departing for Crete. By the time we found the pier we would be leaving from it was about 5:15pm. We were to leave at 9pm. Fortunately they started boarding at 5:30 and we got right on, looked the ship over and took a snooze in our cabin. Pulling out of port was a magical experience. The moon was nearly full and the sky was very clear. Athens was brightly illuminated and you could see the Acropolis on the hill. It was all a sight I will never forget. I was expecting an old tin can of a ship with barely inhabitable cabins but was very pleasantly surprised to the contrary. It was like a cruise ship in many ways. When we got underway and the evening wore on it became evident how it wasn't like a cruise ship though. Many people had only booked for a seat not a cabin. People were spread out everywhere sleeping on the ship. I was grateful for my cabin and shower.

We got up at 4:30am to try to see if we could see the Celtics game on the internet. They had wireless in the lounge (we had a two hour card). The speed was too slow to see it but we got ESPN radio and listened to the second half of the game. The boat docked and unloaded before the game ended and I think we were probably the last people off the ship waiting for the game to end. Too bad for the outcome.

Our day in Crete was off to a running start. We got a rental car and headed for the Knossos Palace which is the site of an ancient palace from 1900-1700 BC. They have done a lot of excavation at the site. The day was cloudless and very hot (probably 90). Out of the sun it wasn't bad. Anyway walking around that site was very interesting but tough in the heat. I quickly realized that Rick walks much faster than me, but he was very patient. The place was definately his cup of tea. It seems unbelievable that you can really be looking at things that old. After that we went to the Antiquities Museum where they had a lot of the original things they took from the Knossos Palace site. There were some things there 4-5000 years old. After that we saw an old fort in the harbor.

After we had done the things in the city of Heraklion we wanted to do we headed out of town to our hotel. It is in a small seaside town that is composed of little hotels, shops, restaurants and the beach. Our hotel is a family run business, very basic, nothing fancy, cheap and fine for the next three nights. By the way, there is no shower curtain in the bathroom. The whole bathroom seems to be the shower. I know many of you have encountered this before in Europe. I was thankful there was a toilet seat because the previous two bathrooms I used in Crete didn't have any. I know you have experienced that also. We swan in the ocean and pool and then had supper. The beach was sandy unlike the stoney beaches in Croatia. The water temperature wasn't any warmer than Croatia despite the very warm weather. It was nice when you were in it but I expected it to be warmer. We had a Greek vegetarian dish for supper made up of potatoes, eggplant, zucchini, tomamtoes, feta cheese and I don't know what else but it was real good. We spotted a laundromat coming into town and Rick is over there doing his laundry. I'm not sure his clothes ever really dried from when I did them in Dubrovnik.

About this Greek lanquage--I know it is from the Bible and all that, but my goodness, how confusing. To read a map or figure anything out with it is impossible (where are Bill and Shawn when I need them). The captain on the ship kept talking very loudly in Greek and there was never any English translation. I hoped the ship wasn't going down. At one point a woman did talk in English and I heard her say something about if we were falling into the sea be sure to bring your life jacket with you. We didn't even know where they were. I was counting on the water being warm if I ever ended up in it. Anyway, thankfully many signs and things are in English and there is quite a mixture of both languages together.

The nice part about this part of the trip for me is that Rick is in charge. He has a great sense of direction and he is making all the plans. I'm just along for the ride. We'll see what tomorrow brings. He is making the plans while his clothes are being done. Talk to you later.