The amazing fresco of leaping over the sacred bull, from Knossos. The painting is about 4,000 years old. Click to enlarge.
This morning, we packed and left Sitia and a brief beach interlude (punctuated by one ruin tromping stop). After four days in Sitia, we drove back to Heraklion, along the mountains, with the rugged Crete coast alongside us.
We came to Heraklion for one night, mainly to catch a ferry from here to Santorini tomorrow morning. We will stay in Santorini one night, check out the calderon, and then head off to Naxos for three days.
The Phaistos disk from the Knossos Minoan Palace. No one has ever succeeded in translating it, although they did manage to translate the texts of Linear A and Linear B (or one of them...I forget. The disks were created in about 1,600 B.C.Click to enlarge.
Naturally, while in Heraklion, we found time to visit the great archaeological museum here, with all its great artifacts from the Minoan civilizations, and in particular Knossos.
Heraklion was even busier and crazier than I remembered it from 25 years ago. Aside from the museum, we went out for a very good dinner--with a great complimentary dessert of flan, a Cretan pastry, and a bottle of grappa.
More tomorrow from Santorini (aka Thira)...
jack, Heraklion Crete, July 10, 2008
---o0o---
