29.9.08

Thera and Crete

29/09/08

Thera to Crete

The last time I blogged I was still on Paros. Since then I have been to both Thera and Crete. Thera is also more popularly known as Santorini, but Santorini is the name that the Phoenicians gave to the island and the locals there prefer to call it Thera. Thera is a neat place for its physical attributes. It once was a whole island but the volcano that once was connected to Thera is now an island and a lot of the land from that island to main land Thera sunk under water during what was thought to have been the largest volcanic eruption that the earth has seen. It is also thought by some people that this was the site of Atlantis, which I thought was pretty cool. We visited the volcano which is still active and it was the first volcano I have ever been to. I was expecting some lava but all I saw was smoke and sulfur, which is still cool but just not what I was expecting. We also went to the hot springs which is made from the volcanic activity. The last day on Thera we went to the black sand beach. This beach was beautiful and had waves which was a change from the quite waters that we have been swimming in up to this point on the trip. The weather has been getting cooler but it is still nice enough to go swimming!

After Thera we took a ferry to Crete. That ride was a trip let me tell you. We were on the top deck, enclosed, and either the ship tipped far enough to the right to hit the water where we were sitting or a huge wave came up to our deck. Some of us just looked at each other with faces that said “was that supposed to happen?!” Anyway, the next morning on Crete we went to Knossos which was the site of a Minoan palace. This was the best thing I have seen in my life never even mind the trip (I feel like I have said this a lot on this trip). The Minoan civilization has been one of my favorites since I was a younger, so seeing this was amazing. The next day before we left on a plane to get back to Athens myself and a few others went on a hunt for The Amber House which is a place where the owners make all the jewelry (mostly from amber). But that was not what I was most interested in finding at that store. I was looking for these things called worry beads, which is a cultural thing here that most of the guys have and play around with everywhere. It has been one of the best purchases that I have made since being here.

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