greece, 2007
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Mykonos
We took a fast ferry from Santorini to Mykonos, a party island at the center of the Cyclades. Mykonos is close to the tiny island of Delos, which (along with Delphi and the Acropolis of Athens) was one of the most significant religious sites of the ancient Greeks.
But Mykonos itself is a tourist haven, catering to party-goers, art lovers and high-end shoppers. We were prepared to encounter a booze fest, but in October the place is relatively subdued.
Our hotel was right outside the port. We had great views of it.
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This pool was way too cold. (But I went in anyway.)
The hotel was teeming with local cats, who liked to make friends with the guests and then get fed by them. This one was particularly
friendly and we hung out with him repeatedly, so we decided to name him. We wanted a Greek-sounding name, so he became Georgopolis.
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The harbor was quite close, so we could walk down in a few minutes.
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An old man in a boat at the harbor.
Old men thinking about boats at the harbor.
Inside the town, the streets are dense, whitewashed, and filled with cute shops, trendy bars and stray cats.
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It's rather fortunate that most Greek signs, at least the ones in areas likely to see tourists, present English translations, but the left side of
this sign should provide a glimpse of what we occasionally had to deal with as users of the friendly and familiar Latin alphabet. Curiously,
Google Maps was the main venue in which we had no choice but to decipher Greek, since they use local languages and alphabets throughout their service.
East of the harbor is a sea-facing area called Little Venice. It has no canals, but it's named after Venice because of its
buildings, which hang over the sea.
It's filled with pubs and cafes.
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The famous buildings of Little Venice.
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The other famous sight in that part of town is the row of Greek windmills along the shore.
Some of these are actually living places, and they looked quite comfy.
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We found Little Venice and the windmills to be as good a place to watch the sunset as any place in Santorini.
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It was even spectacular long after the sun was gone. I've never seen clouds do this.
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Mykonos has a mascot: the white pelican. They had a single member of this species hanging around town for years, and when he died they brought
a few more here. I counted three in the area. These birds are extremely tame, and they like fish. In fact, they seemed content to sit
here under the fishmongers' stands all day.
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We were first introduced to them when we saw this one in the harbor. After a few minutes, he walked toward the shops.
He didn't seem to mind when we followed him around.
He spent a few minutes visiting this jewelry shop, where he interacted with the proprietor. the locals are used to him, and he seems very comfortable
around them.
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We headed home via the new port, which was a bit north of our hotel, and watched these men pull a cruise ship from the mainland to the wharf.
Delos
One day in Mykonos we took a ferry to Delos, the ancient Greek settlement where according to myth Apollo was born. It was a tremendously important city to the Greeks. When the Romans came, they turned it into a free trade zone, attracting merchants from all over. But the island itself has no resources, so the Roman city and Greek temples were eventually abandoned. It's a bit like Pompeii as a result, with dense Roman residential streets and many buildings in surprisingly good shape.
On board the ferry to Delos, which does not run on Mondays.
Looking back at Mykonos port.
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This is the desolate island of Delos from the ferry, and that hill is called Mt. Kynthos.
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This is the Roman city of Delos, which is filled with residential streets.
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Because the island is so dry, the Roman town had cisterns for storing drinking water. These deep chasms still exist under many parts of the city, and
some of the larger houses had their own private cisterns.
The site is famous for its many well preserved mosaic floors. Some are replicas, with the originals in the museum. Archaeologists have traced the 1982 arcade game Q*bert to
this particular one.
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This building not only had its mosaic floor, but its walls and ceilings as well. If you look closely you can see that the stucco walls were painted to look
like marble.
This was a donation jar. The metal hinge for the door into which people threw coins is still present.
We take advantage of a marble seat in the Greek ruins. Legend has it that Apollo was born under a palm tree just a short distance from this seat.
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The site is famous for its row of lions.
Little known fact: the Greeks not only carved a lot of marble, but also had a ton of bronze statuary. Over time the statues were taken and melted, most recently for use in
the war of independence in the nineteenth century. It's rather a shame, because this bronze foot provides a good idea of how well these statues would be preserved if they
hadn't been re-purposed for killing people.
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Looking down at the ruins from Mt. Kynthos, at the far right you can see a little green space in the distance. In the middle of that is a lone palm tree.
That's the Sacred Lake, where the Greeks believed Apollo and his sister Artemis were born. They were the children of Zeus, but were born to a goddess named Leto.
Zeus's wife, Hera, was not pleased about this, and forbade Earth's kingdoms from taking Leto in. So she took refuge on the island and had the children there. They grew up
in the area, and had lots of special powers, including the power of healing, and the power to know when information is posted about them on the Web.
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You're not allowed to spend the night on Delos (not that we were contemplating it), so the only full time residents of the island are lizards. And, of course, cats.
Some of the lizards we encountered were particularly large, but that didn't stop them from being fast.
