Heraklion

“You can’t control the past, but you can control where you go next.”

― Kirsten Hubbard, Wanderlove

Go-Date: Day 53 – 55, Saturday thru Monday. March 16, 17 & 18

Lesson Learned: Figure out what kind of a visit you desire before you book lodging. Through Greece, we’ve had different intent’s for our visits to different locations and we’ve found that understanding your expectations in advance pays huge dividends. So, what the hell does that mean?

In certain places we want to be in city center close to the action, while in others, we want variety and easy escapes. So what do you want? In Athens, we were going to do all the archeological sites with no day trips out of the city. We didn’t have a car, and we needed to plan on walking, public transportation or taxis. We can call this a City Core Itinerary. In this case, we liked using the metro whenever possible.

If you are going to need guides, or know you will be visiting multiple sites in an area, but you don’t necessarily need to stay in the City Center because the sites you wish to see are spread all over the area. You aren’t going drive yourself, you may not brave use of the local public transportation, and using taxis, or hiring a driver may be the way you choose to go. I’d call this a Guided Exploration Itinerary. We plan on this type of visit for Cairo, Egypt. We may alter this once we arrive, but for right now this is our intent.

Outside Athens, we rented a car. Everywhere we went we wanted the ability to get up and get on the road for day trips, but we also wanted to be close enough to the city center to get in and check out all the local sites. In these situations, you’ve got to have parking. We did this in Nafplion. We were only 2 kms from City Center, but far out enough that we took road trips to Olympia, Sparti and others. We’ll call this the Car, Bar, Bazaar & Go-Far Itinerary.

Last, there may an area you want to visit, and just get away from the hustle and bustle of the City Center. You may go in for a visit or two, but going down town isn’t your main focus. This may mean the mountains, or a beach, or some place with a vista that just gives you an AHHHHHHHHHH feeling. This is a Kick Back Itenerary, and the type of residence we found in Chania, Crete.

We’ve done OK picking our styles so far. Our biggest mess-up was in Heraklion when we booked a place for City Core Itinerary but it was too far away (1.5 kms from city center) and we ended up in a crummy neighborhood, too far to walk out and back, and we really had no place we wanted to go outside of town once we did Knossos. We disliked it so much we checked out and lost two days lodging. Don’t make the same mistake. So, what kind of a travel plans do you have:

• City Core Itenerary
• Guided Exploration Itinerary
• Car, Bar, Bazaar & Go-Far Itinerary
• Kick Back Itenerary

There is one other type, where you find yourself on a cruise ship, bus, train, in a group, wearing the same T-shirt, or following a guide with a flag or a funny hat. To each his own, but not for me. You can call that the Point and Shoot Me Itenerary. But, I am biased.

Heraklion, Knossos, and Cutting Your Losses

Zipping down the road from Ag. N., past the leper colony, around the coast, through the mountains, dodging sheep and admiring the olive tree groves we barrel into Heraklion. We hit town about 2, and navigated through the city streets, rough neighborhoods, empty storefronts, and cheap apartments with laundry waving on every floor like flags and bunting on the 4th of July. As we passed each block we kept wondering when the neighborhood would begin to get nicer, and the architecture more Venetian. It didn’t. The Venetians never found this street.

We hate to be unkind, but this neighborhood stinks. I’d say its seen better days, but that’s probably a lie. Its always been a poor working-class neighborhood. We check into the apartment, and its worse on the inside than the outside. The host, older than me, and very nice, with limited English, showed us the unit. I swear it was decorated in post-war furnishings. I mean WWII, and not too long after Germany surrendered. We were not happy.

We went for a walk down to the harbor killing time in the afternoon, because we didn’t want to stay in the apartment, and things didn’t improve. Stray dogs, cafés crowded with old men staring suspiciously at strangers (us), empty retail shops, vacant apartment buildings, and mom & pop markets that have probably been there for 60 years with the same products. This was going to be miserable. We were to be here for only 3 days, so we decided to tough it out.

We went out for dinner, and walked down past the old Venetian fortress. I was of a mind to advise everyone through this blog to get out of Heraklion as quickly as possible. I had seen nothing that would encourage me to hang round for more time than it takes to get out of the harbor or airport and out on the road. But, then we turned the corner from the harbor and walked into another world. I know how Dorothy felt when she discovered the Emerald City.

We already knew that Heraklion (Irakleio to the locals) is the largest city and the administrative capital of the island of Crete. It’s also the fifth largest city (175,000 people) in Greece. Heraklion is close to the ruins of the palace of Knossos, which is really why we wanted to come here (other than catching a plane back to Athens) and in Minoan times was the largest population center on Crete (some things don’t change). Knossos had a port where Heraklion now stands from the beginning of Early Minoan period (3500 to 2100 BC). Around 1500 BC, the port was destroyed by a volcanic tsunami from nearby Santorini, leveling the region and covering it with ash. This was a massive eruption and caused the decline of the entire Minoan culture.

Apart from the historical significance, we found the touristy, artsy, friendly city center we were looking for. There were fountains built in 1628. Ancient administrative buildings, shops, shops, cafés, bars, parks, and lots of people. It was lovely. But, after dinner we began walking back to our apartment (Popi’s place), kicking ourselves because we’d made a mistake in choosing our lodging.

At around 3 AM, neither of us could sleep because the bed was so uncomfortable and the rooms wouldn’t get warm because the heaters just couldn’t generate enough BTUs to dent the chilly solar mass in the walls and floors. Some goofy damn rooster was crowing outside, cats were fighting, and Ellen was giving me serious Stink-Eye. Enough’s enough and we looked around and found a great looking place two blocks from city center on the Internet and booked it.

Under the cover of darkness, we silently moved our luggage out to the car. Silently, because Popi lived just down the hall. No, actually we got up, had coffee, took a shower, and THEN moved our bags out. I didn’t give a damn if he knew we were leaving or not, he had his money after all. As it was, just as we stuffed the last bag into the trunk, Popi came out on the balcony and waved to us. We waved back and got the hell out of Dodge. Success, it was a clean get-away, until I realized I’d left my pocket notebook behind and we had to go back. What was worse, we left the key on the table and locked the door, so I had to get Popi to let us into the apartment. Smiling and nodding, I grabbed my notebook, waved again and we were off to Knossos. I didn’t get many pics of this place. I was too busy dodging Vespas zipping around me at 60 kph.

Fake Palace in an Ancient Site

It’s a fact that Knossos was once the greatest palace of the Minoan age, the capital of Minoan Crete, and one of the most powerful cities in the eastern Mediterranean. Ancient Knossos is also a place of unbelievable legend (think of the Minotaur). Now, it’s Crete’s largest and most important archaeological site. Knossos was built around 2000 BC—and has a fascinating history that stretches all the way back to the earliest cultural civilizations.

Knossos is the largest Bronze Age archaeological site on Crete and has been called Europe’s oldest city by someone, not me. The Heraklion area has had a very long history of human habitation, beginning with the first Neolithic Period (which means the later part of the Stone Age, when ground or polished stone weapons and implements were used instead of tools made of metal) settlement in 7000 BC. I can’t wrap my mind around the fact that people have been living here for 9,000 years, I think Alexandria, VA is old and it was founded in 1749, only 251 years ago. Neolithic remains are prolific in Crete. They are found in caves, rock shelters, houses and settlements, and all the finest cliff-side villas in display cases. The palace was abandoned at the end of the Late Bronze Age, c. 1380–1100 BC probably due to one of many natural disasters that befell the palace.

In the first palace period (there were two periods) around 2000 BC the urban area reached a size of up to 18,000 people, but during its peak in 1700 BC the palace and surrounding city boasted a population of around 100,000 people. The palace was easily the largest on Crete, covering over 8 acres with the main palace structures and separate out-buildings. The buildings must have been amazing, but one feature that does still exists (with a lot of Elmer’s glue) are the pithoi which were large storage jars up to five feet tall. They were mainly used for storage of oil, wool, wine and grain and many were found at Phaestos (which is a Bronze Age archaeological site in south central Crete). They are impressive and amazing to think of the artisans that built them (coil built, I suspect).

From its heyday, Knossos has faced two major catastrophes. First, the above mentioned volcanic eruption and subsequent Tsunami which decimated the palace, and the second was when Sir Arthur Evans was put in charge of excavating the palace and decided to act like Walt Disney and create a fantasy land of his own imagination, but without Mickey.

Arthur Evans took control of Knossos and unilaterally reconstructed it in his own story-book image. Today, archaeology projects are usually undertaken by large teams – usually from universities – and governed by strict local and international regulations. To be chosen to lead an expedition and be granted approval by the local authority certain credentials need to be presented and stipulations met before an archaeologist is allowed to even think about breaking ground; methods and findings of a project are always subject to the close scrutiny of peers throughout a dig.

Evidently, around the turn of the 20th century, things were different: self-taught and very wealthy individuals could easily buy control of a site and do as they pleased without oversight or scrutiny. Mr. Evans was once such figure – a man of both status and means.

In 1899, Evans seized on Crete’s status as a newly-declared autonomous state, and bought the entire archaeological site for an undisclosed sum. Can you imagine buying Niagara Falls and developing it as you will? Oh, hell, that did happen didn’t it? But, it should never have happened to Knossos. Evans quickly recruited a team of henchmen, employed a large staff of local laborers as excavators, and took sole control of the site and inflicted his own image of what he thought it once appeared on the palace by means of concrete and metal rebar. Together they set to work on a massive dig and study at the Palace of Knossos that would rewrite Mediterranean and European prehistory.

His intentions may have been good, but it turns out he had somewhat eccentric restoration ideas for the palace. Rather than leaving the ruins in the state they were uncovered, Evans believed the former splendor of Knossos could somehow be revived – providing future visitors a living vision of the past – he thus set about restoring great sections of the palace. He hired artists with no archaeological training to lead restoration and building activity that run contrary to current archeological standards and really put off experts and authorities of today. Why else is a site such as this still not a UNESCO World Heritage Site? Knossos was recreated in Evans’ own opinionated vision.

Wooden beams, stubby, one-piece reinforced concrete pillars painted an earthy tone of red, and, towering walls, were thrown up left right and center, to prop up crumbling walls, covering original brickwork and features in the process. Attitudes towards Evans’ reconstruction of Knossos among contemporary archaeologists are largely hostile – some regard his actions as tantamount to archaeological delinquency.

The job Evans and his team did in not only fully excavating the remains of Knossos – which today represent Crete’s most popular tourist destination and attract tens of thousands of visitors a year – but also in bequeathing an extensive array of Minoan artefacts to the Heraklion Museum, the largest collection outside of mainland Greece, is highly commendable. Its all the other stuff he did I don’t like.

Archaeological Museum

Lots of the artifacts pulled from Knossos were placed in the archeological museum in Heraklion. The ones that weren’t pillaged from the site, that is. So, they started a small museum in 1883 that had as much trouble staying open as did the palace. After three destructive earthquakes in 1926, 1930, and 1935, and bombings by Nazi Germany during the invasion of Crete in 1941 the museum nearly collapsed. Thankfully, it didn’t happen because it holds some amazing artifacts.

The Herakleion Archaeological Museum is one of the largest and most important museums in Greece, and one of our favorites. It houses representative artifacts from all the periods of Cretan prehistory and history, covering a chronological span of over 5,500 years from the Neolithic period to Roman times. The singularly important Minoan collection contains unique examples of Minoan art, many of them true masterpieces. The Heraklion Museum is rightly considered as the museum of Minoan culture par excellence worldwide.

The museum is located in old town. Which is another reason we moved out from Popi’s apartment. So far, Ellen and I have visited the following museums:

• Acropolis Museum
• Athens War Museum
• National Archeological Museum of Greece
• Delphi Museum
• Olympia Museum
• Epidaurus Museum
• Nafplion Archeological Museum
• Nafplion Culture Museum
• Archeological Museum of Chania
• Maritime Museum of Chania
• Archeological Museum of Heraklion

Downtown Living

Staying in old town has been great. We moved into a 6-story hotel named the Kastro (www.kastro-hotel.gr). We must have really looked haggard because the desk clerk upgraded us to the penthouse. Never to turn down an upgrade, we now had a two-room suite, nice bath, private balcony, and access to the shared balcony with the next door suite. Did I mention it was great?

It was a bit of a challenge getting to the city parking lot, but it turned out to be half a block away from the Kastro and only cost about $8 a night (6 Euros) so we were thrilled. On top of that, we were two blocks to the center of Heraklion, which is a blast.

I must mention two restaurants we found which should be on everyone’s must do list if you are in this town. The first night we stumbled upon Hairi -Nutritious Cretan Cuisine (www.facebook.com/hairi.gr/; https://www.hairi.gr/en). I do literally mean stumble. We turned the wrong way while going down town and Ellen tripped on a flagstone and we stopped, saw an interesting doorway, and looked in on a fabulous looking bistro that would not be out of place in Carmel by the Sea. It was great looking, and when we entered, we knew we made the right decision. Great food. Great prices. Great wine. Super wait staff. I didn’t meet them, but the kitchen staff put a fabulous product on the table. We were so impressed, I did a review on Trip Advisor, and I never do that.

The next night found us walking down the same street, being sure to avoid that hazardous flagstone and came upon Peskesi (https://peskesicrete.gr/en/). Right next door to Hairi (up the alley to the side). Peskesi is doing the Cretan farm to table routine with incredible flair and ability to put a fabulous product on your table. Again, the food, staff, kitchen, and prices are worth raving about. I don’t know when we’ll make it back to Crete, but I promise we will stay over for two days in Heraklion just to stay at the Kastro and eat at Peskesi and Hairi once more. I don’t get paid for this, I’m not a tout, but I want people to read this and visit these businesses because we got great value, great service, and amazing product (room, food).