Greece East

One of the challenges to doing this website is deciding how long to make a page before it's too cumbersome, both for us and our gentle readers. In the case of Greece we had a bunch of material on places, but maybe not enough to do separate pages for each place. We have the further problem that if the task gets too big then we never get around to finishing it. So, we start in the Aegean and sail west, trying to take in major historical spots on the way. Let's get cracking!

Naxos

The unfinished Temple of Apollo was the first landmark sighted as we sailed into the bay. High on a hill it overlooks the ancient town of Bourgos, where the Greeks lived.

Naxos, along with its sister island of Paxos, was a major source of the fine white marble used in Greco-Roman statuary and buildings throughout the ancient world. Here it's just a bunch of rocks and you find marble used as street pavement and even for the seawalls.

The lovely village of Chora.

You can see a gray band near the top, which form the walls of the Venetian Kastro. During the disastrous Fourth Crusade, which failed to do anything for the Holy Land but led to the sacking of Constantinople, the Venetians helped themselves to many of the islands in the Aegean. Naxos was one of them.

The Kastro is a delightful, artistic warren of shops and fancy private dwellings.

Far from the busy waterfront we climbed up narrow alleyways which led us deep into the ancient Kastro which was a heavy fortification . Now it is a residential area bathed with trendy shops , restaurants, museums and antique venues.

This sought after neighborhood with ancient walls and flowering bougainvillea was besotted with jewelry vendors and artists plying their various exhibitions.

Can you imagine the joy of having an antique shop with columns like this! Original beams included! The house was built by Venetians in 1636, but the columns were looted from some ancient Greek temple, a practice we've seen everywhere.

Back at the ranch..errrr...waterfront, it was time to think about lunch. Fresh from the Sea, Naxians are big on octopus.

We did forgo our marine treats and decide to venture by bus to the mountainous village of Halki. First on our agenda, after a nose bleed ascent, were the culinary delights of this little taverna tucked away behind an alley.

Halki has some beautiful and historic old villa's .

Being a sucker for flowers, the door at the top of the stairs really goes nowhere.

Wandering around after lunch we found this interesting niche on the grounds of one of the Byzantine churches.

Peering into old courtyards run over with weeds and obviously uninhabited, we could not help but fancy ourselves interlopers.

Hummmmm........a barrel of wine. Maybe not so empty after all

Did we deface a tree? yes. Children that we are, John used a coin to carve JW plus VW. Awwwwwwww.

Delos

You have to look closely, but if you do you'll see this barren island is just covered with temples. This is the sacred island of Delos, which formed the center of the Greek universe in the Aegean. We had to take a ferry boat here because the island is closed to private boats. That part was OK, but we only had 2 hours and it took dogged effort to cover even half this island's riches. Mount Kythnos is the hill toward the right. Delos was revered as the birthplace of twin gods Apollo and Artemis.

The view from Mt Kythnos. The barren island of Rinia is to the upper left, Tinos is in the distance to the upper right. Delos has always been tightly controlled. In ancient times no one could be born or die here. Nowadays nobody can spend the night, caretakers excepted. The island has been flattened by earthquakes over the millennia and we suspect they don't want treasure hunters digging the place up.

One of the few semi-intact temples was devoted to to Egyptian goddess Isis. Why? Well, they seemed to take a very ecumenical approach and set aside an area for foreign deities. In the foreground is a sacrificial altar, which can be discerned by the 4 "horns" at the corners.

At one time the city was razed, burned to the ground. Here we see the foundations and intact pottery recovered.

Pottery still in the same place eons ago.

The lake houses of Delos had exquisite mosaic floors. To be able to see these works of art and know that they were designed 450 B.C. is mind blowing.

The famous Naxian Lions, still roaring in the sunrise after 2,600 years.

Yes, this is what it looks like; we have no idea what the goose was for. Actually, there was a whole street lined with these "phallic symbols", but the admiral may have decided one was enough to illustrate the concept. Does anyone out there remember 'Clockwork Orange'? Side Bar: Still recall going to the Texas theatre on the drag and being so horrified by this scene that walking out was the only strategy to clear this young mind.

Just one of the many exquisite mosaics in Delos .Look at those teeth and eyes!

Another shot from Mt Kythnos, this time of the famous but gawdawfull island of Mykonos. At one time it was the playground of the jetset but is now overrun by college students debauching on pathetic beaches 50 yards long and 10 wide. Our ferry stopped there longer than at Delos and it was every bit as bad as Phuket, maybe worse. We met an old guy who told us what it was like in the good old days, rowing a fishing boat all day. Now he runs a gyros shop - maybe it's better for him...

This is our only picture of Mykonos, a pretty little church. There are way too many sinners here for this tiny effort.

Santorini

Santorini is hands-down the most beautiful and spectacular island in the Aegean. It is the remnants of a much larger volcanic island that exploded about 1600BC, the largest eruption in recorded history. The event gave rise to the legend of Atlantis. This is the eastern chunk of the caldera; the white strip near the middle is the town of Thira.

We really, really wanted to sail the boat there but it's a ways south of Naxos and we worried we wouldn't find a safe place to park the boat. So, as you can see we hopped a ferry from Naxos/Paxos with about a zillion other touristas. The white layer at the top of the island behind the ferry is the perfectly whitewashed Cycladean town of Oia. You can see some local boats moored along the water's edge but the caldera is very "steep to", being 1300' deep.

This is the harbor where ferry boats arrive; it's about the only place to park large vessels inside the caldera. We suspect the cruise ships just putter around.

Boy, this picture requires a lot of explanation. The blurred effect is due to the camera being on the wrong setting, i.e. it held the shutter down as long as the button was pushed. What looked at first like potato fields turned out to be vineyards! The meltemi wind is so fierce here that they don't try to put the vines up but let them grow on the ground.

This is the main square in the town of Oia, complete with bone white church.

The houses here seem to grow out of the volcanic rock. We can tell from looking that the white stuff here is a kind of "tuff" made from molten, foamy glass with a few rocks stuck in. That means an explosive volcano.

Austin Realtors , eat your heart out!

These immaculate white washed villas against a cerulean sky make for a magical holiday get a way.

Too look at these extravagant delights of architecture one would be lead to infer that here there is no poverty or illness. A lofty fantasy!

Just another Bodega.

Getting ready for a sumptuous lunch. Peasants not included.

The black island behind the cruise ship is Nea Kammeni, the new volcano slowly building in the center of the caldera. It is just a mass of lava and is reputed to be swarming with large, bold rats. There were some anchorages here, but we have been told the Med rats have no problem swimming out to a boat and climbing the anchor chain, if they're motivated (read:hungry enough). This was another reason we decided not to come here.

On the whole, however, if there was any place in the Aegean we wish we could have visited at more length, it would have been Santorini. Our "tour" consisted of the ferry ride and a bus trip to Oia and Thira. By the second stop we were frustrated by the focus on forced shopping (something we loathed on our China trip). It got worse because Aegean island stores all close between 3-6PM for a kind of siesta, meaning all we could do was wait for the bus in a town with the sidewalks rolled up. We hate organized tours...

Anyway, that's our series of visits to islands in the Aegean. Be sure to visit Greece West and Athens!

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