Iraklion and the Palace at Knossos

Thursday December 16, 2010 Day 169

From our breakfast table, we watched the start of the docking process, as we did not dock in Iraklion until after 9:00. When we left the dining room, we went outside to stroll on the deck and watch more of the docking. Roger suggested that the tie-down ropes are Kevlar, because of their golden yellow color.

Crete

Iraklion, on the island of Crete

We boarded a tour bus again, this time for a trip to the ruins of the palace at Knossos. Our guide was a woman who spoke reasonably good English, but unfortunately the idea of the radio headphones has not made it to Crete, and at Knossos, we had to stand around in the rain and try to hear what she had to say. At the entrance to the palace, Roger bought an umbrella for five euros since we did not bring one on the cruise; in fact, we seem to have mislaid ours completely.

Palace at Knossos in the rain

 The palace covers some six acres, and included a theatre, a main entrance on each of its four cardinal faces, and extensive storerooms called magazines. Some of the storerooms contained pithoi,or large clay vases which held oil, grains, dried fish, beans, and olives. The palace had grain mills, oil presses, and wine presses. Beneath the pithoi were stone holes used to store more valuable objects, such as gold. Other parts of the palace include a throne room and a numerous bedroom, miscellaneous rooms, a toilet and bathtub. The palace had a complex system of fresh water, runoff water management and sewers.

Storage jars

The ruins were discovered in 1878 by a Cretan merchant, and were fully excavated by Sir Arthur Evans starting in 1900. There is much controversy regarding his excavation, particularly his theories about the purpose of many things, and regarding his restoration. For instance, he turned the painting of the throne room over to a father-and-son team of artists, and their “restorations” are said to be almost complete inventions of theirs.

The tour lasted too long, particularly because we were not always able to hear our guide. On the way back, we got the tour director to let us off the bus in front of an electronics store, and we went in and found a universal charger for Roger’s netbook.On our walk back to the ship, we passed a store with a solar water heater on display out front. As we looked around, we saw several of them on rooftops.

Our tour did not leave the ship until 11:00, which was poor timing, as no lunch stop was included and we did not return to the ship until after 3:00. We were rather hungry by the time we got back on board the ship.

The evening entertainment was a comedian named Paul Adams. Our itinerary called for the ship to collect him in Athens and discharge him the next day in Izmir. Because of the port change he had to get from Athens to Crete. Somewhere between Gatwick Airport and Crete his luggage disappeared. He appeared on stage in blue jeans, tennis shoes and a blue and white plaid shirt, all quite new-looking. A good deal of this comic routine centered around his lost luggage and his clothing. He was quite funny, and gets extra points for a clean, family-oriented performance.