Crete

Hey all,

We’re just got back to our hotel in Athens (as of time of writing) about half an hour ago (7:45 am on May 25th), and everyone is sitting around waiting for our rooms to be ready so we can nap/read/shower and enjoy our day off. More interesting, however, is that we just got back from Crete!

I’ll spare you the details of what we were doing, because you can read them in exhaustive detail on the official blog, and because you probably don’t care that much about the intricacies of Minoan palace architecture. Incidentally, if you do follow the official blog, you may have noticed a change toward a more formal and educational tone in most of the entries. That’s because the blog entries are now about a third of our grade with the new professor (Rutter), whereas PCC basically counted them for participation only. Anyway…

Crete was one of my favorite places on the trip, even just looking at the landscape. It’s extremely mountainous, and there was even some snow on the mountaintops in places. Unfortunately, most of the really high mountains were in western Crete, and we spent approximately zero time out there because there aren’t any fancy Minoan palaces in that region. The academic focus of the trip has shifted from Archaic and Classical Period material to the Bronze Age cultures of the Minoans (on Crete) and the Mycenaeans (on the mainland). We spent most of our working time looking at Minoan palaces and cemeteries, with a few villas and later sites mixed in.

We've also had a lot more non-working time, partly because Prof. Rutter is a bit more relaxed than PCC and partly because it was in the high 90s almost every day on Crete, so we took some time off in the middle of the day in order to not die of heat prostration. We also did a lot less hiking than I was expecting us to do, but Cam and I still got some good runs in.

Text is boring. Here are some photos:

The view from Mt. Iuktas, the peak sanctuary (a type of Minoan religious site) associated with Knossos, which is straight ahead on the plain far below. 

The Archaic to Hellenistic polis of Lato, of which we all have a billion pictures because we had a paper assignment about comparing it to Gournia, a Minoan settlement. 

Zakros, a small Minoan palace by the sea. 

The Gorge of the Dead (or "Dead's Gorge," as the sign called it), where burials from Zakros are found. 

Cam's killing it with the style choices. 

This was taken in the back of a pickup truck taking us to a site (we didn't have time to hike up and down before sunset, so we settled for just hiking down...lame). Yes, that is Cam's favorite shirt. 

Phaistos, my personal favorite of the Minoan palaces. 

The lighthouse at Chania, where we caught the ferry back to Athens.

We're going to the Peloponnese (actually, we're in the Peloponnese now...I'm finishing this up at the hotel in Nafplio) and then Boeotia to look at Mycenaean sites. One week left! How bittersweet. Hope everything is well for all the readers of this blog.

Laurel

Update in pictures

Well, I officially suck at keeping up with this blog (so does Cam, but we had this alternating post thing going, so I feel it's more my fault than his). I hope you have all been at least periodically looking at the official blog of the trip, which can be found here. Anyway, I thought I'd try to catch up by posting a few pictures and highlights that didn't necessarily make it into the official blog.

Here's a view of Delphi, the famous sanctuary of Apollo where there was an oracle that allegedly told the Greeks to do all sorts of weird stuff. I had to hike out on a cliff to get this picture. It's a beautiful site, and very interesting as well.

This is the area of the Meteora, where there are a bunch of Byzantine monasteries on the tops and sides of these sandstone pillars. The landscape reminded me a lot of Utah. Cam went running for a lot of the day (it was basically a day off with semi-mandatory education). I spent most of the day hiking with PCC (our prof for that part of the trip) and two other students, finding caves and exploring cliff dwellings.

 

 Here's Cam at the highest monastery (Grand Meteora). My group ran into him when we followed a random supply path up the mountain from a cave.

After a while more in Northern Greece, we went to Istanbul, which was pretty freaking amazing. Here are some crazy tiles and stained-glass windows in Topkapi Palace, the residence of the sultans.

This is the dome of the Selimiye Mosque at Edirne, near the Greek border. I was part of small group that took a side trip up there on our day off in Istanbul. It's a really amazing building, considered the masterpiece of the greatest Ottoman architect, Mimar Sinan.

Me in Selimiye wearing mosque-appropriate clothes.

After our time in Istanbul, we spent our last days with PCC (aka Prof. Christesen, aka the prof who wears vests all the time...but not in Greece) on the island of Andros. Half of the group, including myself, stayed in a beautiful house far away from the beach with no wifi (where this photo was taken). The other half stayed in a hotel near the beach with wifi. I think we got the better end of the deal...

...especially because PCC brought us groceries twice a day, and there were fresh eggs and a huge fruit and vegetable garden at the house. Awesome.

We're on Crete right now with Prof. (Emeritus) Rutter, one of the foremost experts on Bronze Age archaeology in the Aegean. This is the Grand Staircase at Knossos, the largest of the Minoan palace complexes on Crete. This thing would have been 4-5 stories high, which is pretty cool for being so old.

Well, that's all I can think of for now, plus we're supposed to be meeting to celebrate one of our group's birthday's (shoutout to Rocio Cara Labrador for turning 20!). So long for now,

Laurel