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Published: August 8th 2006
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On Sunday night I arrived in Heraklion (capital of Crete) on the fast ferry from Santorini. With Jane heading back to the UK yesterday I am cutting my own track through Crete for four days, spending one day in Heraklion and 3 days in Hania, on the western side of the island.
From what I have seen so far I think that I like Crete better than anywhere I have been yet, even magnificent Sanotrini. The difference is in the friendly people and the way they say hello to you in the street without the expectation that you will dine in their Taverna or buy their goods. There isn't the desperation to milk tourist dollars like in the greek islands or the in your face rudeness of Athens. Then there is Crete itself, which is a mix between picturesque towns, rolling countryside and great beaches.
Anyway I got off to an early start on Monday by heading to the ancient ruins of Knossos, which are 5km outside Heraklion and Crete's main tourist attraction. Knossos was the capital of the ancient Minoan civilisation that ruled Crete around 2000 BC and the site was discovered and excavated by a Welsh archaelogist
The Throne Room ... allegedly
Or is it a storage closet? The new paint scrubbed up nicely though. called Arthur Evans about 100 years ago. Needless to say all of this is right up my alley so I was very much looking forward to checking it out. However after wondering at Athen's ancient Acropolis and the ancient ruins on Delos, it was hugely deflating to see the patched up fairytale that Knossos had become.
First of all Evans decided that old ruins wouldn't do so he started pouring concrete all over the show and also repainting the frescos to try to recreate the Palace in its original glory. Unfortunately he was guessing all the way so all he succeeded in doing was reconstructing the place to suit how he thought it should look. In some cases you can barely tell where the ancient marble ends and the concrete begins. And as he had no appreciation of how the Minoans had built the place, as he dug he found rooms and pretty much guessed at what they had once been used for. He declared one small room to be called the "Throne Room" just because it had a particularly intricate marble bench in it, while the "Shrine of Double Axes" is this hall where he apparently found a
The Charging Bull Fresco ... apparently
Sporting a nice and vibrant paint job and some nice new concrete columns. I wonder what it really looked like. couple of axes. Don't get me wrong I realise that after 4000 years it is hard to determine these things, but when someone has a theory and states it as fact, that pisses me off. So in my view the Palace of Knossos must have once been a spectacular and important building but it now has the integrity of Disneyland.
Ok so after putting Knossos behind me I headed back into Heraklion and checked out the old Venetian fort along the waterfront before boarding my bus for Hania. The bus ride was quite good really, as it allowed me to check the Cretan countryside on the way. It is pretty much all rolling hill country covered in olive trees that finishes up in mountains, and in a funny way it reminds you a lot of NZ countryside.
We arrived in Hania in the late afternoon and I made it to my accommodation without too much trouble. I am staying in the Old Town which surrounds a picturesque little harbour which is ringed by restaurants and bars. Like the rest of Crete, Hania was occupied by the Venetians quite some time and their influence is everywhere. Having not been
Shrine of Double Axes ... hopefully
Now this looks nice and old. Hang on is that a concrete altar they built on the right? I take it all back this is clearly an important shrine. Or maybe some stables. Or a shed. to Venice I can't really comment but apparently if you imagine the streets in the Old Town to be canals you begin to get it.
I spent most of today exploring the city and waterfront. One thing about the Cretans is that the guys are really macho, much more than the rest of the Greek people. They have this fascination with knives and apparently in the countryside Cretan men carry great big knives on their belts just like anyone would carry a cellphone. As a result there are heaps of knife shops selling anything from pocket knifes right through to enormous broadswords and battle axes. I found myself swept up in all the testosterone and was compelled to buy something weighty and sharp, so I am now the proud owner of the a mean looking carving knife, complete with Cretan inscriptions along the blade .
Tomorrow I have a big day planned touring the battlefields where the NZ soldiers fought in WWII. Hania was the centre of all the fighting and the Kiwis did themselves proud resisting the German invasion but more on that in the next post.
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