June 3, 2014
Crete Day 1
Morning came after a very restful sleep. I popped out of bed and took a look outside my hotel window. The skies were grey with a mixture of clouds and fog. After a quick shower, I met Darrell and Sofia in the hotel restaurant for breakfast.
After breakfast, I went to my room to gather my equipment then it was down to the lobby to wait for out ride. Our driver met us at the front corner of the hotel. We boarded and were off to see the Palace of Knossos.
The Palace of Knossos is only a 10 minute drive south of the Galaxy hotel. As we drove near to the main parking lot, we saw a very touristy strip center of souvenir shops, which seemed to offer just about everything including gold , silver, and jewelry. We didn't have time to take a look, but I'm certain that anyone wanting to test their bartering skills would be aptly challenged here.
There was a pretty decent line to get inside. We were just waiting for our guide to meet us with entry tickets. The line area and the entry area were all covered by overhead trellises, most covered with grape vines. The local doves seemed to enjoy perching on them.
Once inside the archeological site, our guide gave us some background on the history of the Palace of Knossos dating back beyond 2000 B.C. In the most well known Greek myth surrounding the early city, King Minos hired the Athenian architect, mathematician, and inventor Daedelus to design his palace in a way that no one who entered could find their way back out without a guide. There is another version in which a labyrinth within the palace was built to house the half-man/half-bull the Minotaur. In order to keep Daedelus from telling the secrets of the palace, Minos locked him and his son Icarus in a high tower at Knossos and kept them prisoners. Daedelus made wings out of wax and bird's feathers for himself and his son. He taught Icarus how to fly and warned him not too fly too high as the sun would melt the wax. They did escape the labyrinth, but Icarus did not heed his father's warnings and flew too close to the sun, melted his wings and fell to his death in the sea. This myth was my absolute favorite from my elementary school days. It was an amazing experience to stand on the ground of its origin. Knossos is also recognized as one of the oldest cities in Europe. In touring the site, one can easily see the magnitude of the Minoan civilization and it's contributions to the modern world. The most interesting being an example of the world's first plumbing. In the following pictures you will see two showing what is believed to be the world's first sewer pipes well over 4000 years old. Knossos may also be the home of the first "flush" toilet, as there is a ground floor latrine with an overhead water reservoir.
The Royal Road is one of the oldest and best preserved roads in Europe.
The wine trade here was extremely advanced as is seen by the extensive storage areas and many elaborate amphora.
The breathtaking fresco in the Queen's chambers shows the deep connection and appreciation the Minoans had with the sea.
4000 year old sewer pipes.
After viewing all of the archeological site, we ended up at the visitor's center. They have a very nice gift shop and snack bar. A few of us, myself included, bought a glass of fresh squeezed orange juice from the snack bar. It was absolutely delicious and hit the spot.
Here's a link for more information on the Palace of Knossos. http://www.explorecrete.com/Knossos/knossos.html
We headed back to the limo van and made our way south through numerous valleys and hill crests for about 30 minutes. Our next stop was at Lyrarakis Winery.
The overcast skies we had while touring the Palace of Knossos began to develop into clouds as we got closer to Lyrarakis winery. We pulled into the Lyrarakis winery estate which is surrounded by a large number of olive trees. When we got out of the limo van, we were hit by very gusty winds. The Lyrarakis winery is at just about 1500' elevation at the upper crest of the surrounding hills. Just to the south of the winery, much higher peaks can be easily seen. We took a look at the grounds and some of the vines growing close by. They had a variety called Plyto only grows in the eastern part of Crete and on the Greek island of Kythera just to the south of the Peloponnese. This variety was literally resurrected from near extinction. It is characterized by its unique high acidity and lemony flavors. The wind howled and we even heard a few cracks of thunder off in the distance during our walk of the grounds.
We made our way into the winery to take part in the 6th wine tasting of the tour. Counting the small tasting we had with Madame Kourakou, and the tasting at Restaurant Merastri dinner last night made this our 8th tasting over all in the past 5 days. We made our way through all of the eight tables of wine. The tasting was consistent with last night's tasting at Restaurant Merastri in that the wines here showed the same uniqueness of Cretan terrior. The Cretan producers seem to have their own high level of pride in Cretan wine history and wine making abilities.
When we finished our tasting, we moved into an adjacent room where a family style lunch was set up for us. We sat and enjoyed the traditional stuffed grapes leaves, local Cretan cheeses, Lamb meat balls, roasted lamb, rustic bread, and savory filo pastry along with some of the wine from the tasting.
Here's a link to the Lyrarakis Winery website: www.lyrarakis.gr
Completely satisfied with our lunch, it was now time to board our limo van for the drive back down to our hotel for some rare afternoon free time. The driver took a different route back to Heraklion, which saw us mainly on ridge roads. The views down into the valleys really showed off the vastness of olive orchards and vineyards.
Once back at the hotel, I decided to see if I could find some places to shop for gifts to bring home. Mark told us that he took a very cool walk down to the harbor after last night's dinner. His recount appealed to me, so I headed north from the hotel to retrace his steps. I walked north about 4 blocks and came upon a small coffee shop. I ordered an ice coffee frappe. The clerk took instant coffee, added it to hot water, then some cane sugar, and then used a high speed hand blender to whip the mix. When I saw it become very frothy, I told her it was good. She poured in some ice and it was ready to go. I paid her for the iced frappe and a bottle of water. It came to 1.65 Euros, which is about $2.15. A bargain, I thought.
Two blocks further, on the other side of the street was Georgiadis Park, which connects to a few other parks via a green-way belt.
The road forks at the end of the park. I took the right fork for a few blocks. The road began to steeply descend as the harbor came into view. The only problem was that a bit of a green-belt gorge began to come into view too. It was on my left side, so I figured it was better to go back and take the left fork rather than continue to walk down with the chance of being cut off by the gorge. That turned out to be a good move. I came to Liberty Square just two blocs further, which had a movie theater and numerous shops and restaurants on its perimeter. I went down one of the brick paved streets lined with shops and found more than enough to fill a few small bags with trinkets to bring home as gifts for family.
I continued down the street after shopping and came across the Morozini Fountain, which was built in 1629 during the Venetian period of Crete. The further I continued, the more interesting it became with the Heraklion town hall, which was built by the Venetians, churches, cafes, and more shops.
I made it all the way down to the old Venetian Harbor whose stand out photo opportunity is the Venetian fortress of Rocca al Mare. The fortress also known as the Koules Fortress, had origins dating back to the 9th century. The site had numerous reconstructions over centuries with the Venetian reconstruct finished by the year 1540. Once at the docks, there were quite a few different things to see which point to the deep connection the Cretans have with the sea. Fishing boats, nets, traps, sea shells, and sponges were all around the harbor.
I would have loved to explore the harbor further and taken the walk out to the Venetian fortress, but my free time was running low, so it was time to make my way back to the hotel.
A Heraklion street food vendor
Back at the hotel, I had enough time to freshen up a bit then it was on to our next stop. The Alexakis winery is a family owned and operated winery located on the south west edge of Heraklion. It began in the late 1970's and is the largest winery on the island of Crete.
Here is a link to the Alexakis winery website: alexakiswines.com
The massive concrete wine tanks at Alexakis winery are reminiscent of what many California wineries looked like pre 1960's.
Alexakis winery founder, Stelios Alexakis and his two Oenologist sons Lazaros and Apostolos greeted us when we arrived. We took a quick look around because the skies were still cloudy and a sudden series of very strong wind gusts blew through so much so that it blew down some of the chairs sitting outside the tasting room. Some heavy intermittent rain drops also began to fall. They led us into a media room to watch a short film on wine in Crete. After the film, there was a small tasting of six 6 Alexakis wines, which Apostolos poured for us. All six wines were very solid, balanced, and highly drinkable.
After the tasting, we quickly boarded the limo van to make our next tasting. The skies began to clear and we were treated to a Cretan rainbow for a few minutes.
Our next stop was about a 30 minute drive just to the south west of Alexakis winery. There was an abundance of beautiful sights along the way, and even a few examples of very steep vineyards which are still being tended. Sofia had set up another wine tasting at the Doulofakis winery in the town of Dafnes. The village of Dafnes dates back to the 10th century. Wine is such an integral part of the town that they hold a two week wine festival there every year.
We entered the Doulofakis winery to find eight tables set up for our wine tasting. There were about 40 wines, so we grabbed our tasting sheets and a glass then got busy. Here's a link to the Doulofakis winery: www.cretanwines
The variety of Vidiano was abundant at this tasting. It is a variety mainly found, in small plantings around the area of Rethymnon in Crete. Typically lemony green in color, Vidiano can be intense in flavor with complex aromas of ripe peach and apricot, hints of aromatic herbs and minerality. Another very enjoyable tasting. Professional wine tastings can be and usually do become fatiguing at some point. I was amazed that this usual occurrence had yet to present itself here in Greece. We were treated to a tasting of some very good Cretan sea salt. I really like it as it had somewhat the same flakiness as Maldon sea salt from Britain and a clean flavor.
The tasting lasted past sunset. I took a look outside at just the right time to see a beautiful, silvery grey Cretan sunset.
Evening was upon us. We had a log day filled with three wine tastings, some amazing sight seeing, and a good amount of free time. Dinner was next on our agenda. It was a very short drive to the nearby Arodamos traditional Cretan restaurant. The restaurant had a very inviting patio and a very rustic stone interior complete with high wooden raftered ceilings. There was a musical duet set up in the back corner of the restaurant by the fire place. We were serenaded by traditional Cretan music during dinner. The duet used a classic bouzouki guitar and hand drum. Dinner came our in what seemed like never ending courses. Some of the dishes were things we already experienced like Santorini Fava, fried regional cheese with lemon, and roasted lamb. On the unique side, we were served a dish of Cretan snails in a couscous type pilaf, and beef in parchment which was reminiscent of bollito.
Here is a link to the Arodamos Facebook page - www.facebook.com/Arodamos
Mark and Pano each had a go at the traditional bouzouki
Our musical entertainment of the evening - The Dravidians, Antonis Fragiadakis and Lila Katsouna. Antonis is one of the most accomplished performers of the Cretan lute in modern Crete. Have a listen.
Here's another song they played, which I liked very much. It has a very folk like feel and interesting changes including some dialogue and very nice upbeat bouzouki picking by Antonis.
Here is a link to their Facebook page - www.facebook.com/arodamos.dafnes
It was safe to say that we were all stuffed after the delicious dinner. The dishes paired well with the wines that were brought along from the Doulofakis winery. After this evenings experience, I think that Cretan cuisine would be completely lost without Cretan wines at the table. The evening came to an end, so we boarded our limo van and made our way back to the Galaxy hotel. We had to be up early, packed, and ready to go to Santorini in the morning.