Blogs from Crete, Greece, Europe - page 37

Well yesterday was a huge long day. The alarm went off at five; I slept till half past, but Kathleena had to get ready and stuff. So we headed out around quarter two six, in order catch the six fifteen bus to the mouth of the Samaria Gorge near Omalos. We got to the bus station to find that our information was faulty. The first bus didn't leave until eight thirty. So we went back to our pension and rested for another little while, till actually catching the bus. I slept, between marvelling at the amazing scenery. Huge hills with deep deep valleys in between, all this dry orangey colour, and littered with these scrubby green bushes, as well as scrubby white sheep. We got to the gorge around ten, and set off after eating a ... read more

So. I am in Chania, a smallish town on the north coast of Crete, the largest, southernmost Greek isle. The place was originally built by Venetian nobility, in an exodus where one sixth of Venice came here. Accordingly there is an old Venetian harbour and fortress, all crumbling, old stone. It is nice here. You wouldn't believe it's in the same country as Athens, such is the difference. It is tranquil relaxing laid back...the waiters don't try to hustle you...the food is cheaper and better, as is the liquor. They don't drink ouzo as much as raki here. Raki is similar to Italian grappa, distilled from the skins, seeds, and stems of grapes;what's left over after the grapes have been mashed for wine. It has a smell that flickers between whisky and tequila, and a taste ... read more

Since I last wrote, two weeks ago, I have had limited access to the internet. This update is long overdue. To continue the journey, I went to Rethymno which is the third largest city on Crete. It was located right on the coast and had great beaches. There wasn’t much planned there except for free days that were spent shopping, going to a health club, running along side walls with crashing waves, and laying on the beach. The next stop was the Orthodox Academy about a half and hour from Hania. I stayed there for two nights and learned more about the workings of the people of Crete to create a better country and community by the year 2020. I also went to an Orthodox church service called Icon Sunday and visited a workshop where they ... read more

Well I know I haven’t posted in a while now, but all of the school computers (17 of the 20 of us took school laptops on this trip so we didn’t have to take our own) stopped working, well they stopped connecting to wireless, so we have been internetless for a while. Three people who didn’t bring school computers are able to get internet, so we have just been attempting to share those for the last week now. But anyways, we have been in Vamos, Crete since last Thursday. Vamos is a small town (pop. 665) between Chania and Rethymno. We are staying in cute little guest houses spread out all over town. We haven’t done a ton of stuff since we’ve been here, so I’ll just sum up what we have done over the last ... read more

We are at the Orthodox Academy near Chania, Crete right now. It is a lot different than I thought it was going to be. But first, I’ll start with the last town we were in… Rethymno, which is about 30,000 people, so decent sized. We didn’t have any group activities there, which was great. We didn’t get there til later in the afternoon on Thursday, so when we got there we just wandered around town for a little while. Then we had dinner at the hotel, which was really good. There was a big variety; it was a buffet. Pretty typical food. Lots of different salads, some cucumber and tomato, some cabbage based. And then there was really good meat patties (like big meat balls with no sauce) and then I dipped them in tzatzaki (a ... read more