Crete, post the third
Sep. 10th, 2008 08:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hawkwing_lbWatch me lose track of what day it was.
Tuesday: Agios Nikolaos Archaeological Museum.
The Archaeological Museum in Agios Nikolaos is located on a hill beside one of the town's two hospitals. Well, three-quarters of the town is hill, so of course it's on one. It houses finds from the eastern part of the island. It's representative, and if not extensive, well, certainly quite large enough.
The finds span from the Neolithic period to the Roman one, a span of, oh, just a little over three thousand years. It's home to the Prepalatial, not unfamous, "Myrtos goddess" figurine (Preziosi and Hitchcock, 1999, pg49-51, have a good brief section on the Prepalatial finds at Myrtos, including "goddess" figurine), of which I did not take a picture because a)it's famous, and b)my books have better illustrations of it than I could do myself.
It's also home to a collection of larnakes, one of which still has its occupant, one of the largest figures of the Postpalatial "goddess with upraised arms" type yet recovered - several half-lifesize ones exist - votive figurines from the peak sanctuaries, including the peak sanctuary at Petsophas, some impressively overgrown amphorae recovered from the sea, and oh, numerous other really cool things. Protogeometric burial, a big coin collection, Middle Minoan gold jewellery, finds from Mallia and Mochlos and Myrtos and Kato Zakro and Ierapetra.
It was... impressive. Seriously. I have many more pictures. But after the morning's sojourn in the museum, I spent the rest of the day hiding from the heat. Apart from dinner in a place called, "Trata."
Wednesday: Diving.
I did the refresher dive. I was under fifty-two minutes, relearning how to move underwater, with a nice French boy-instructor called Baptiste. Went through the basic drills - clearing the mask, recovering a dropped regulator, fin pivot and buoyancy - and then just swam around. There are two dead cars and any amount of the debris of civilisation on the bottom: pots, bricks, etc. I'm not sure how old any of them are, but it was cool.
The water wasn't especially silent, seeing as we were so close to a harbour and a beach full of swimmers, but still. The descent into that alien landscape, the rocks, grown with a thin coat of tan weed and silt, dropping down to sandy bottom and tiny frondy weeds, the fish - so many fish, so many sizes, from tiny black minnows to fish the size of my arm, and all colours, silver and black and tan and multicoloured and glittering, and the alien spikiness of sea urchins in holes in the rocks, and tiny specks of silt floating past your mask.
The fragility of your mask and tank, all that separates you from drowning. The pressure isn't crushing, not at only ten metres or so under -- you don't really feel it until you get down to twenty or deeper, three atmospheres of pressure pressing down from above -- and when you tilt your head around and look up, you can see the surface, that whole other world, not so very far above, the sunlight fragmented into a thousand white-golden ripples off the surface.
I'd forgotten how much it makes me think, afterwards, about the alien depth of the oceans, all that dark and perfect mystery of an unexplored frontier, inimical landscapes.
Apart from diving, I didn't do much else. Except nearly die of heat. ~43 Celsius in the hottest part of the day. Discovered I could like plums. And honey melon. And that a place called "la Casa" did tasty food. Came to the conclusion that I cannot maintain conditioning in the heat, and would be a fool to try.
Thursday: Ierapetra.
Ierapetra, pronounced Hierapetra. There's been a city on the site since Classical times, although not much remains to be seen today. The Venetian period survives a little better, with a fort (of which I have many more pictures than you will see on Flickr). More fort. And me. There is a Turkish quarter, a fountain under renovation, and something that was once a mosque and is now either derelict or under renovation, I couldn't tell which. And churches. Everywhere has churches in Crete.
Also, there is a waterfront with many bars, and a stony beach near the fortress. We took the morning bus from Agios Nikolaos, which passes through Istro, passes by the site of Gournia, and across the isthmus through Kalo Chorio and Kalo Ammos. You can see the Chalasmenos Gorge from the bus.
In Ierapetra, we did the mad dogs and Irishwomen trick, the parent and I, and wandered around in the heat, supported by water and blue Powerade. Until we'd seen everything the parent would stand to walk around, and then we went swimming, and afterwards repaired to a bar along the waterfront. The parent had a pina colada, and I had milkshakes. Crete is full of good milkshakes. Then we got (one of) the evening bus(es) home.
When we got back to Ag. Nik., we managed to stagger as far as the taxis -- with stops for drinks and salt -- by the tourist information centre by the harbour, and taxied back to the apartments before I collapsed: the parent claimed she was fine: in fact, she went out to get more water and stuff. I had been starting to think I was adapting, but, ah. Rather less so than I'd imagined.
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday will follow. Although I will note here the weird dream I had on Saturday night - my dreams in Crete were rather fertile, to say the least. Very vivid and memorable, and full of narrative.
Anyway. At the at the tail end of Saturday night, I dreamed of travelling to Toronto, except the city resembled a mirror-maze version of Dublin and bits and pieces of American cities as seen on tv, all distorted and labyrinthine. And I got lost by a river, and eventually found the bar where -- for some reason -- I was supposed to meet![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
cristalia and some handsome Greek bloke who appeared to be her boy.
And in the manner of dreams, it turned out to be my birthday - or somebody's birthday, at least - and everyone knew. And wouldn't listen to me when I got embarrassed about celebrating. And J. and C., who I (in the dream) had met and left in a mirror-maze version of Dublin airport (complete with palm trees) turned up. And there were pink lanterns on the tables, and in the logic of dreams, the celebration changed, and became one forcristalia's book deal and movie option.
So, you know. That one was a little unusual for my dreams: they're usually more full of people trying to kill me.
Tuesday: Agios Nikolaos Archaeological Museum.
The Archaeological Museum in Agios Nikolaos is located on a hill beside one of the town's two hospitals. Well, three-quarters of the town is hill, so of course it's on one. It houses finds from the eastern part of the island. It's representative, and if not extensive, well, certainly quite large enough.
The finds span from the Neolithic period to the Roman one, a span of, oh, just a little over three thousand years. It's home to the Prepalatial, not unfamous, "Myrtos goddess" figurine (Preziosi and Hitchcock, 1999, pg49-51, have a good brief section on the Prepalatial finds at Myrtos, including "goddess" figurine), of which I did not take a picture because a)it's famous, and b)my books have better illustrations of it than I could do myself.
It's also home to a collection of larnakes, one of which still has its occupant, one of the largest figures of the Postpalatial "goddess with upraised arms" type yet recovered - several half-lifesize ones exist - votive figurines from the peak sanctuaries, including the peak sanctuary at Petsophas, some impressively overgrown amphorae recovered from the sea, and oh, numerous other really cool things. Protogeometric burial, a big coin collection, Middle Minoan gold jewellery, finds from Mallia and Mochlos and Myrtos and Kato Zakro and Ierapetra.
It was... impressive. Seriously. I have many more pictures. But after the morning's sojourn in the museum, I spent the rest of the day hiding from the heat. Apart from dinner in a place called, "Trata."
Wednesday: Diving.
I did the refresher dive. I was under fifty-two minutes, relearning how to move underwater, with a nice French boy-instructor called Baptiste. Went through the basic drills - clearing the mask, recovering a dropped regulator, fin pivot and buoyancy - and then just swam around. There are two dead cars and any amount of the debris of civilisation on the bottom: pots, bricks, etc. I'm not sure how old any of them are, but it was cool.
The water wasn't especially silent, seeing as we were so close to a harbour and a beach full of swimmers, but still. The descent into that alien landscape, the rocks, grown with a thin coat of tan weed and silt, dropping down to sandy bottom and tiny frondy weeds, the fish - so many fish, so many sizes, from tiny black minnows to fish the size of my arm, and all colours, silver and black and tan and multicoloured and glittering, and the alien spikiness of sea urchins in holes in the rocks, and tiny specks of silt floating past your mask.
The fragility of your mask and tank, all that separates you from drowning. The pressure isn't crushing, not at only ten metres or so under -- you don't really feel it until you get down to twenty or deeper, three atmospheres of pressure pressing down from above -- and when you tilt your head around and look up, you can see the surface, that whole other world, not so very far above, the sunlight fragmented into a thousand white-golden ripples off the surface.
I'd forgotten how much it makes me think, afterwards, about the alien depth of the oceans, all that dark and perfect mystery of an unexplored frontier, inimical landscapes.
Apart from diving, I didn't do much else. Except nearly die of heat. ~43 Celsius in the hottest part of the day. Discovered I could like plums. And honey melon. And that a place called "la Casa" did tasty food. Came to the conclusion that I cannot maintain conditioning in the heat, and would be a fool to try.
Thursday: Ierapetra.
Ierapetra, pronounced Hierapetra. There's been a city on the site since Classical times, although not much remains to be seen today. The Venetian period survives a little better, with a fort (of which I have many more pictures than you will see on Flickr). More fort. And me. There is a Turkish quarter, a fountain under renovation, and something that was once a mosque and is now either derelict or under renovation, I couldn't tell which. And churches. Everywhere has churches in Crete.
Also, there is a waterfront with many bars, and a stony beach near the fortress. We took the morning bus from Agios Nikolaos, which passes through Istro, passes by the site of Gournia, and across the isthmus through Kalo Chorio and Kalo Ammos. You can see the Chalasmenos Gorge from the bus.
In Ierapetra, we did the mad dogs and Irishwomen trick, the parent and I, and wandered around in the heat, supported by water and blue Powerade. Until we'd seen everything the parent would stand to walk around, and then we went swimming, and afterwards repaired to a bar along the waterfront. The parent had a pina colada, and I had milkshakes. Crete is full of good milkshakes. Then we got (one of) the evening bus(es) home.
When we got back to Ag. Nik., we managed to stagger as far as the taxis -- with stops for drinks and salt -- by the tourist information centre by the harbour, and taxied back to the apartments before I collapsed: the parent claimed she was fine: in fact, she went out to get more water and stuff. I had been starting to think I was adapting, but, ah. Rather less so than I'd imagined.
Friday, Saturday, and Sunday will follow. Although I will note here the weird dream I had on Saturday night - my dreams in Crete were rather fertile, to say the least. Very vivid and memorable, and full of narrative.
Anyway. At the at the tail end of Saturday night, I dreamed of travelling to Toronto, except the city resembled a mirror-maze version of Dublin and bits and pieces of American cities as seen on tv, all distorted and labyrinthine. And I got lost by a river, and eventually found the bar where -- for some reason -- I was supposed to meet
cristalia and some handsome Greek bloke who appeared to be her boy.And in the manner of dreams, it turned out to be my birthday - or somebody's birthday, at least - and everyone knew. And wouldn't listen to me when I got embarrassed about celebrating. And J. and C., who I (in the dream) had met and left in a mirror-maze version of Dublin airport (complete with palm trees) turned up. And there were pink lanterns on the tables, and in the logic of dreams, the celebration changed, and became one for
cristalia's book deal and movie option.So, you know. That one was a little unusual for my dreams: they're usually more full of people trying to kill me.
