Crete, post the first
Sep. 7th, 2008 08:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hawkwing_lbOn Thursday, before our minor exodus, I went climbing. Four routes, much improvement: only sent one of them, but I got my hand on the top hold of the white 5 (it's been regraded to a 4+), but there's nothing on it, no friction, no purchase. I also improved the greys, to the top of the overhang, and a couple of other routes, and ended up ripping the middle part of my right hand's middle finger down to blood. Luckily R., the gorgeous engineering MA from Amsterdam, had surgical tape, because I wasn't about to stop. (It's only just started to heal.)
Thursday was a good day. I got my mile in nine minutes, and my 1.5 in 14:30, and after climbing went to the open mic poetry's third anniversary. There was poetry, much of it good, and chocolate cake, and a couple of people whose opinions I respect complimented my mass grave/war crimes poem, which reassures me that it is not made of complete fail.
Of course, I didn't get home until midnight, and I had to get up at three am.
And all that progress has been lost now.
was spent in travelling. Monarch Airlines may be cheaper than Olympic, but they're much less comfortable. Though it was truly excellent to have a direct flight. Herakleion was... very much as I remembered it, white and yellow and hot and dusty. We took a taxi to the bus station and caught the next bus to Agios Nikolaos, after icecream from the bus station shop. I fell asleep during the drive, nodding off in the yellow afternoon heat, as the bus wound for ninety minutes through red rock hills and olive groves, past small towns and tourist resorts.
Agios Nikolaos is not quite all hill. But close. A taxi from the bus station took us down to the apartments. It was five o'clock in the evening, local time, by then, but the British lady at reception got us settled into our wee studio pretty quick.
And that was when I realised that I didn't have to be worried anymore. You see, when I was in Istro, fifteen minutes on down the road, there were four of us in a tiny apartment where the air-conditioning didn't really work so well, and neither did the toilet or the shower head. (Do not flush toilet paper down the toilet is... kind of icky, in a hot climate. Okay, so maybe I'm too used to the way things work at home, but still. Kind of icky.) The boys in the next apartment complained of cockroaches, and we found a mummified gecko on the floor. To say nothing of the constant thunderous cacophony of the cicadas. (And none of that would have mattered to me if I'd just been able to sleep.)
But here, the apartment was airy and clean and the shower works and you can flush your toilet paper. And the A/C unit is right over the bed. Best of all, there are no cicadas, and if I have to retreat to the cool under the A/C between the hours of eleven and three and lie like a pancake on the bed, I can.
I mean, theoretically I understand that people can live and work in this kind of heat? I know for some people 29, 30, 31 degrees Celsius is actually not that hot? (I don't get it, but I know that for some people, it is.) But stepping out into Friday evening, and the air nearly warm as blood even after sunset - I'm not made for heat like this. And the next time I visit the Med, it will be in springtime. Definitely before June. Because up to the late thirties in the daytime? Is so not my favourite weather.
(Which is not to say I wasn't enjoying myself. As long as I don't have to do much, I'm good. And being able to swim regularly is great for cooling off.)
So Friday night, we got a taxi to a great place called La Strada, an Italian restaurant. The only thing I hate about this place is everyone smokes, and they don't seem to have heard of non-smoking sections, but we sat at a tiny table perched on a slanting, uneven path, and the wind - definitely a strong breeze, probably 5 or 6 on the beaufort scale - blew and it was almost cool enough to be comfortable. The food was great, really tasty, and compared to Ireland, incredibly reasonable. (You would never get a good burger for seven fifty at home. Seriously.) Then we strolled down towards the lake - there's a tiny lake in the middle of the town, just adjacent to the marina - and looked at the road that led back to the apartments. All uphill. So, being exhausted, we caught another taxi.
Saturday we got up, had breakfast and a swim on the roof, then the parent went shopping while I lay like a pancake under the a/c. Food. Water. Yohgurt, really tasty ham and cheese and salami, bread. The essentials of breakfast and lunch for two days. The ham and cheese is really tasty.
By the time I was willing to stick my nose out into the heat, it was half three. We walked down to a sandy beach and swam, I found a dive outfit and got details, and then we walked along the promenade into town and the tourist information office, and I got details on a number of places.
Dinner after dark by the lake, where we were treated to a political rally (you can tell from the tone of voice, doesn't matter what language) from the other side of the lake by the Kappa Kappa Epsilon, which appears to be a socialist, or possibly communist party: red flags and rhetoric of "demokratia!" and "sosialismos!" The nice waiter (the boys here are frequently very pretty) confirmed our guess. Afterwards there was live music: the odd thing about having done koine Greek is that every so often I'll recognise a word or phrase completely without context, so I know this guy was singing about thanatos agapé, death love, or death and love, but I've no idea why.
This morning Agios Nikolaos suffered a blackout between about 0630 and 0930. No idea why, but neither we nor anyone else had power for about three hours: I woke up gasping from the heat because the a/c had stopped. It's odd when that happens: even at home I always wonder if it's not the beginning of the apocalypse, and no one's bothered to let you know.
So we breakfasted late, and swam in the tiny rooftop pool, and then at eleven I retreated back away from the yellow face in all its burny glory into the gloriously cool apartment, which - with the a/c set to 18 Celsius - I would consider warm at home.
At about three thirty, we set out along the bay northward in search of the Byzantine church of Aghios Nikolaos, from which, the guidebooks say, the town takes its name. We got there after about an hour, after a walk that was on the punishing side of hot.
It's small blocky building of local limestone, surmounted by a bell in an arch and a tiny dome. Like many Orthodox chapels, really. Red rooftiles absorb that punishing sun. Inside is cool and dark, and stepping from brightness to shadow is blinding. Fragments of medieval frescos remain, on the wall behind and adjacent to the altar, and on the arch below the dome. Sunlight rays through the narrow arch of the upper window, like a shaft from heaven. And it's quiet, the noise of cicadas hushed and muted by the stone.
A gold candelabra stood just inside the door. An icon to some unrecognisable saint on the wall to the left as you entered. A white cloth covered the altar, which also supported an icon. And standing there, in that tiny, empty and yet somehow cavernous space, I think I understood why churches raised domes and spires towards heaven. That orientation upwards - it draws the eye away from the ground, into something that might not be infinity but could easily be confused with it.
Pictures start here. I like this shot of the exterior best myself. And the view through the window
(I don't have a pro account. So pictures may be limited.)
After, we repaired to a nearby bar, where the parent, half-dead, gratefully downed two glasses of beer and I rehydrated with icecream.
The walk back seemed shorter, but it was somewhat cooler by then, and we swam from the municipal beach on the way. After a shower and a rest at the apartment, we went out for dinner, to a place by the lake, Hotel du Lac, Café du Lac, something like that. Mum said her food was fine, but I ordered burger, and it arrived pink and squishy on the inside, the consistency of oatmeal, and not very warm. So that was fairly ick: it made me feel kind of ill.
Monday, and the island of Spinalonga - former Venetian fortress, Turkish fortress, and one of the last leper colonies in Europe - to follow.
Thursday was a good day. I got my mile in nine minutes, and my 1.5 in 14:30, and after climbing went to the open mic poetry's third anniversary. There was poetry, much of it good, and chocolate cake, and a couple of people whose opinions I respect complimented my mass grave/war crimes poem, which reassures me that it is not made of complete fail.
Of course, I didn't get home until midnight, and I had to get up at three am.
And all that progress has been lost now.
was spent in travelling. Monarch Airlines may be cheaper than Olympic, but they're much less comfortable. Though it was truly excellent to have a direct flight. Herakleion was... very much as I remembered it, white and yellow and hot and dusty. We took a taxi to the bus station and caught the next bus to Agios Nikolaos, after icecream from the bus station shop. I fell asleep during the drive, nodding off in the yellow afternoon heat, as the bus wound for ninety minutes through red rock hills and olive groves, past small towns and tourist resorts.
Agios Nikolaos is not quite all hill. But close. A taxi from the bus station took us down to the apartments. It was five o'clock in the evening, local time, by then, but the British lady at reception got us settled into our wee studio pretty quick.
And that was when I realised that I didn't have to be worried anymore. You see, when I was in Istro, fifteen minutes on down the road, there were four of us in a tiny apartment where the air-conditioning didn't really work so well, and neither did the toilet or the shower head. (Do not flush toilet paper down the toilet is... kind of icky, in a hot climate. Okay, so maybe I'm too used to the way things work at home, but still. Kind of icky.) The boys in the next apartment complained of cockroaches, and we found a mummified gecko on the floor. To say nothing of the constant thunderous cacophony of the cicadas. (And none of that would have mattered to me if I'd just been able to sleep.)
But here, the apartment was airy and clean and the shower works and you can flush your toilet paper. And the A/C unit is right over the bed. Best of all, there are no cicadas, and if I have to retreat to the cool under the A/C between the hours of eleven and three and lie like a pancake on the bed, I can.
I mean, theoretically I understand that people can live and work in this kind of heat? I know for some people 29, 30, 31 degrees Celsius is actually not that hot? (I don't get it, but I know that for some people, it is.) But stepping out into Friday evening, and the air nearly warm as blood even after sunset - I'm not made for heat like this. And the next time I visit the Med, it will be in springtime. Definitely before June. Because up to the late thirties in the daytime? Is so not my favourite weather.
(Which is not to say I wasn't enjoying myself. As long as I don't have to do much, I'm good. And being able to swim regularly is great for cooling off.)
So Friday night, we got a taxi to a great place called La Strada, an Italian restaurant. The only thing I hate about this place is everyone smokes, and they don't seem to have heard of non-smoking sections, but we sat at a tiny table perched on a slanting, uneven path, and the wind - definitely a strong breeze, probably 5 or 6 on the beaufort scale - blew and it was almost cool enough to be comfortable. The food was great, really tasty, and compared to Ireland, incredibly reasonable. (You would never get a good burger for seven fifty at home. Seriously.) Then we strolled down towards the lake - there's a tiny lake in the middle of the town, just adjacent to the marina - and looked at the road that led back to the apartments. All uphill. So, being exhausted, we caught another taxi.
Saturday we got up, had breakfast and a swim on the roof, then the parent went shopping while I lay like a pancake under the a/c. Food. Water. Yohgurt, really tasty ham and cheese and salami, bread. The essentials of breakfast and lunch for two days. The ham and cheese is really tasty.
By the time I was willing to stick my nose out into the heat, it was half three. We walked down to a sandy beach and swam, I found a dive outfit and got details, and then we walked along the promenade into town and the tourist information office, and I got details on a number of places.
Dinner after dark by the lake, where we were treated to a political rally (you can tell from the tone of voice, doesn't matter what language) from the other side of the lake by the Kappa Kappa Epsilon, which appears to be a socialist, or possibly communist party: red flags and rhetoric of "demokratia!" and "sosialismos!" The nice waiter (the boys here are frequently very pretty) confirmed our guess. Afterwards there was live music: the odd thing about having done koine Greek is that every so often I'll recognise a word or phrase completely without context, so I know this guy was singing about thanatos agapé, death love, or death and love, but I've no idea why.
This morning Agios Nikolaos suffered a blackout between about 0630 and 0930. No idea why, but neither we nor anyone else had power for about three hours: I woke up gasping from the heat because the a/c had stopped. It's odd when that happens: even at home I always wonder if it's not the beginning of the apocalypse, and no one's bothered to let you know.
So we breakfasted late, and swam in the tiny rooftop pool, and then at eleven I retreated back away from the yellow face in all its burny glory into the gloriously cool apartment, which - with the a/c set to 18 Celsius - I would consider warm at home.
At about three thirty, we set out along the bay northward in search of the Byzantine church of Aghios Nikolaos, from which, the guidebooks say, the town takes its name. We got there after about an hour, after a walk that was on the punishing side of hot.
It's small blocky building of local limestone, surmounted by a bell in an arch and a tiny dome. Like many Orthodox chapels, really. Red rooftiles absorb that punishing sun. Inside is cool and dark, and stepping from brightness to shadow is blinding. Fragments of medieval frescos remain, on the wall behind and adjacent to the altar, and on the arch below the dome. Sunlight rays through the narrow arch of the upper window, like a shaft from heaven. And it's quiet, the noise of cicadas hushed and muted by the stone.
A gold candelabra stood just inside the door. An icon to some unrecognisable saint on the wall to the left as you entered. A white cloth covered the altar, which also supported an icon. And standing there, in that tiny, empty and yet somehow cavernous space, I think I understood why churches raised domes and spires towards heaven. That orientation upwards - it draws the eye away from the ground, into something that might not be infinity but could easily be confused with it.
Pictures start here. I like this shot of the exterior best myself. And the view through the window
(I don't have a pro account. So pictures may be limited.)
After, we repaired to a nearby bar, where the parent, half-dead, gratefully downed two glasses of beer and I rehydrated with icecream.
The walk back seemed shorter, but it was somewhat cooler by then, and we swam from the municipal beach on the way. After a shower and a rest at the apartment, we went out for dinner, to a place by the lake, Hotel du Lac, Café du Lac, something like that. Mum said her food was fine, but I ordered burger, and it arrived pink and squishy on the inside, the consistency of oatmeal, and not very warm. So that was fairly ick: it made me feel kind of ill.
Monday, and the island of Spinalonga - former Venetian fortress, Turkish fortress, and one of the last leper colonies in Europe - to follow.
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no subject
Date: 2008-09-08 06:31 pm (UTC)The Venetian period on crete may come into the next Heirs book so I may pick your brain for landscapes - paying for 2 kids at uni travelling will be resticted...
Good on you for the climbing. It comes back faster every time.
no subject
Date: 2008-09-08 07:29 pm (UTC)It's kind of fabulous. And changeable. In spring and late autumn, it's much greener, I'm told.