Before moving here, I met a woman online who was about to make her own permanent move to Crete. She has located in the far eastern part of the island, in Sitia, and we've kept in touch via Facebook (oh, what did we ever do before Facebook?). Chantal has graciously invited me to stay with her on the night I will spend in Sitia, and I'm very much looking forward to my visit with her, as well as the various locations I plan to stop at on my way there and back. The plan:
10 September: Depart Drapanias no later than 9am, drive three hours to Heraklion, where I will dutifully visit Knossos, the most well-known of the ancient Minoan palaces. I realize my blog entries thus far have been a little short on substance, so hopefully I'll come back with lots of interesting tid-bits for you history buffs. Or at least some good pictures. Maybe I'll just provide you with links to books to read for the historical part:-D
After spending an hour or two at Knossos (I know, I know...I could probably spend DAYS there and not see everything...whatever) I will proceed on to Ayios Nikolaos, "the center of Crete's most upmarket tourism" according to the Rough Guide. It is supposed to be a very picturesque, pretty place and I'm looking forward to seeing it. I'll spend the night there, and then...
11 September: Depending on what time I wake up, and how much of the town I managed to take in the night before, I will head towards Sitia, which looks to be about an hour's drive. If I'm up early enough I plan to drive past Sitia and visit Vai and it's beach, which claims to have Europe's only date-palm grove. Afterwards, Chantal and I have plans to meet in the center of Sitia for dinner before retiring to her place for the night.
12 September: Heading back home via same road I came, I anticipate around a three and a half hour drive before taking a turn to the south to visit Anoyia, a town that sits just beneath the highest peaks of the Psiloritis mountain range. In addition to being the ideal location from which to visit the Idean cave, the village is also one of those that was pretty much razed by the Germans in retribution for the abduction of General Kreipe.
The Idean Cave is one of the two contested locations claimed to be the birthplace of Zeus (the other is the Dhiktean Cave a bit to the east and in a different mountain range), and the reports that Pythagoras and Plato both visited the cave make it enough of a draw for me, silly superstitions aside.
As for General Kreipe...I recently read the book "Ill Met By Moonlight" by one of the foreign fellows who helped abduct him, and the town of Anoyia is one of those that they had hoped to spare from retribution by making it look like no Cretans were involved in the abduction. Didn't work out as planned, and I'll be fascinated to see what one of the unfortunate villages actually looks like now.
13 September: Not sure how events will play out on the 12th, and whether I'll be able to vistit the cave on that day or have to wait until the next, but I hope to be home by nightfall on the 13th.
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2 comments:
Wow. Should be quite a trip. I just read in History of Philosophy by Bertrand Russell that the ancient world generally considered "all Cretians to be liars" -- so be careful who you take at their word! Of course, they may have changed by now and ber the most honest people on Earth. Or maybe it was a bum rap in the first place, started by some liar from Sicily or Ionia.
Since I have no idea what they're saying most of the time, I guess I won't even know:-)
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