We caught the bus to Hersonissos again in the morning. This time we bought two round-trip tickets on the city bus for Heraklion, the biggest city on Crete (as far as we know), and the one right by the airport. The bus ride was a very hot and crowded 40 minutes. On the way into the city we passed a McDonald’s, a strangely familiar sight given everything else we’d seen. By the time we got off the bus we were both very hungry, and we were wondering how different (or the same) that McDonald’s menu might be, so we wound our way to it. I say wound our way because there are quite a few elevation changes (and very tall, steep walls) in Heraklion. We did find the McDonald’s, and evidently it’s still being built. So I couldn’t tell you how different (or the same) their menu might be.
We wound our way back into the heart of the city, finding the statue of Venizelos, which told us we were right by El Eftherias Square. There were many cafes in the square, and we picked one right on the edge so we could eat and do some people watching. I (Matt) had the Spaghetti Bolognese and Andrea had a club sandwich. We weren’t feeling too food-venturous today, although everything you get is never exactly what you expect. The Spaghetti Bolognese, as an example, was more buttered noodles with some meat on them. We were struck by just how much graffiti there was in the city. I mean, every concrete surface was tagged, and not in terribly interesting, creative, or colorful ways. It really lent to the impression of a city that wasn’t quite comfortable being a big city yet, a city that converted a chunk of roads to pedestrians only because they were just too narrow and too crowded to handle the population growth.
After lunch we walked over to the Archeological Museum. The main building has been under renovation since late 2006, so we went to the smaller, temporary exhibit. They’ve got a cool collection of early Minoan artifacts, from early stone tools and ladles to Greek marble statues and frescoes. One piece of note is the intricately crafted gold bee pendant. It’s incredible to see the amount of fine detail this civilization was able to achieve, especially given that we’re talking about 1000 BC. Another was an ancient figurine of the (from the display) “Snake Goddess. The goddess, or priestess, is depicted with exposed breasts and wearing a rich garment. Her bared breasts suggest her capacity as a fertility goddess. The snakes and the feline on her head are an allusion to her dominion over nature. [From] Knossos. New-Palace period (1600 BC).” Haha, Carol we found an ACTUAL fertility goddess, and it’s not a pig. 😉 We also saw a bunch of touchdown statues, clearly to celebrate a touchdown. I don’t even know what they really represent…I think we can all agree that’s the universal sign for touchdown. Interestingly, these would predate “Touchdown Jesus” by almost 3000 years. Food for thought. We made our way through the exhibit and back out onto the streets of Heraklion.
We did a little window shopping and made our way to the Morozini fountain. It’s a cool looking old fountain. I can’t imagine what else to write about it, other than there were many pictures by it. Nearby we saw the Basilica of St. Mark and town hall, cool looking old stone buildings surrounded by what Andrea coined “dead” dogs. There were dogs all over, and I (Matt) contend that they were sleeping, but Andrea’s convinced one (laying down, surrounded by hot dog pieces) was dead. Because of this, town hall was renamed “The Hall of Dead Dogs.” 😦 That’s just sad; I still prefer town hall. Hi Toby, we love you!
We wandered the streets, heading towards the Cathedral of Ayios Menas. At one point we wound into what we would name “Party City,” which was this long collection of indoor/outdoor clubs absolutely packed with young Greeks. It was about 1 PM on a Tuesday, and these places were absolutely packed, and everybody was there to see and be seen. We were not. We were in the wrong place. I overheard some laughs and an “Americanos” comment, and it was the most uncomfortable I’ve felt, I admit. We were very happy to get out of Party City, and back to doing our super touristy things.
After leaving Party City, we finally made our way to the beautiful 19th century Cathedral. We sat there and enjoyed the area for a few minutes when we realized that there was a smaller church to the left of the Cathedral. This church was a wooden Medieval church; I (Andrea) preferred this church to the large ornate church.
On the way back north we swung by the Venetian arsenali, an ancient fortress on the water’s edge. It’s old, it’s made of stone, and it’s massive. It’s also awkward to get a decent picture of. See my (Matt) crappy pictures as proof positive. Unfortunately this area also had some open dumpsters, so a bouquet of rot and trash permeated everything. Time to move on.
It was getting late and Matt and I were both getting tired. We walked back to the bus station and caught the number two bus back to Hersonissos (this bus luckily had air conditioning) and then caught the Village Heights bus back to the apartment. Having the sun beat down on us as we walked around Heraklion was exhausting and resting in our room sounded great to both of us. We picked up a movie (X-Men 3: The Last Stand) from the club desk and finally arrived back in our room.
After a few hours of resting in our room we decided to go to Asian night at the buffet. Coming to Greece we knew that everything would be an adventure; this was most true about the food. Matt: The spring rolls and sweet and sour pork were pretty good; everything else was blech, bland and wrong. I (Andrea) also enjoyed the spring rolls and sweet and sour pork but I also liked seafood salad, and the vegetable rice. Matt got a bowl of ice cream for us to share. None of the types were labeled so he picked us the neon yellow, bright red, and brown ones. The yellow, we thought would be lemon, ended up tasting like banana Laffy Taffy. The red was a very sweet strawberry, and the brown was chocolate.
Dinner was done and we both were concerned with how the food would settle in our stomachs; luckily we were just fine. Back in our room we watched our movie and finally headed to bed around 10:30PM. It was a really busy day, and we were exhausted.
matt & andrea 