Olympia
The first sight that greeted us after arrival in Greece was this:
There was a London Flagged cruise ship leaving town, and needed it's days supply of beer. Staggering, but seeing the stomachs on some of the guys (mainly 50's and 60's) getting on the boat, I understood. They liked beer, lots of beer.
When one leaves San Francisco and heads south for 800 km (480 miles), folks joke about the two Californias, northern and southern. Usually the dividing line is discussed as being somewhere north of Santa Barbara and south of San Luis Obisbo. When one gets to San Diego from San Francisco, the language is the same, the cars are the same, the heterogeneous nature of the people is the same, the restaurants are the same (better bread in SF), the cultures are roughly similar. Roughly, give me a break here, I'll get to the point. Contrast this to the Adriatic Coastline. We left Kotor and steamed at 20 knots an hour southwards, arriving at Katakalon, Greece which is the stop-off to visit Olympia, the continuous winner of the Olympic games for hundreds of years before the International Olympic Committee got into the act.
Greece and Croatia/Montenegro are two different planets. The geography is different, the languages are different, the lighting and climate is different. It feels different, it smells different. Very strange. So we land in the town in Greece, and we are off to join a Tournami. I looked into a Car/Driver, but it was going to cost a fortune for the eight of us (our five, and my friend's plus their son), so off on the Tournami we went. Not too terrible, as Olympia is off the beaten path except for the cruise ship crowd, and there was only one other boat in town besides ours (sometimes there are five to seven).
Olympia started getting used for the Olympics about 700BC, and was used for hundreds of years, really until one of the Roman emperor's basically rigged all the games so he was the winner. The site was also razed over the years by various folks that were upset that the athletic part of the Olympics were mixed with lots of Pagan rites and a whole bunch of Gods. The site itself was excavated in the 1700's and 1800's, surprise, surprise, because it was covered by multiple floods over time, gradually burying the ruins
A bunch of earthquakes over the centuries did not help matters very much. It was REALLY hot while we were there, and there was no place to buy water, and the only water was at the gates of what was a very large site, as all the temples and workout areas covered some ground. It was a very weird atmosphere, and reminded us in a strange, HOT, arid way of Angkor Wat. Before long, I was starting to shoot in Black and White again, as the site was monochromatic, dusty, and (did I mention?) hot. There was not really all too much there, as the main areas were excavated and stripped of most of the good stuff, but our guide was excellent (for a Tournami) and did a good job giving the flavors of 'what was where' at Olympia.
These were REALLY big temples. For some of the temples, these columns were five or six feet in diameter. It was a massive effort to build Olympia, as it it a long way from Athens, and not too much closer to anything else. When the Olympiad happened, it caused an general truce in Greece, and up to a hundred thousand people descended on this site for a week of events, as well as lots of back room wheeling and dealing.
The "Stadia" was pretty much in place, and a highlight of the day was watching my kids to a slow run (it was hot) from one end to the other, about 660 feet end to end. There were interesting statues lying around, many with carved footprints of winners of various events over the years. No cereal boxes, or multimillion dollar endorsement deals here, just an olive wreath, or so the legends go. But in actuality, these guys had it made when they went back home, keys to the city, exemption from taxes, and invites to all the good parties. There were also the remains of some statues from the later years of the Olympics, from cheaters that were caught and had to pay fines. No steroids back then, but there were lots of judges to be bribed. Floods, earthquakes, and human nature are all immutable constants, and all are on display at Olympia.
So we drank some more water, went to the museum of the Olympiad, which was very cool, but no photo's allowed, joined the rest of our Tournami on our bus (no stickers!), and headed off to the boat to start eating again. And off to Santorini we went…
Santorini
Santorini was an island that I had always wanted to visit. Storied and history, spectacular, I had intended to visit Santorini in 1983 when I travelled to Europe one summer, but my buddy and I got sidetracked in Ios, which then (and I guess now) is one of the leading kid party islands on the planet. So we never made it to Santorini. My belief was that Santorini was the 'crater rim' of a massive volcano that blew in 1600 BC. It is, but it is not just a crescent, but an island that lost a big chunk of itself, and has continued to blow up and shake continuously. Santorini is literally a disaster area, and one of our first sites in the morning was seeing the floating circle marking where a Greek Cruise Ship sank earlier this year (the dark line circle in the photo below). It would have been an ironic, ludicrous joke about how lame it is to sink a cruise ship on a tourist route, but a man and his daughter died, making the site a bit more somber. From the crater rim, you can see where oil continues to leak from the site.
Santorini DID blow up in 1600 BC, with many thinking that the cataclysm marked the end of the Minoan civilization. The eruption was MASSIVE, as the scale of the caldera is bigger than anything I have any seen. A big chunk of the island disappeared, and one can only guess was to what happened to neighbor islands due to ash or tsunamis (real ones). However, the eruption left one of the more spectacular vistas that I have ever seen, as well as some of the most creative and spectacular villages on earth. For the folks haved lived on Santorini for their lives, nature's nastiness is not just in the past. The last eruption was in 1950, and the place continues to shake. Our guide (yes, our second and LAST Tournami of this trip) was describing the Olive industry on Santorini, how there were eight olive processing plants until and earthquake in 1956 destroyed them all, now there is just one. Anybody noticing a theme here? Any description the island's history was peppered with 'earthquake this' and 'eruption that', and how the popluce left in the 50's and 60's, and has only grown in the last 20 years (where not surprisingly there is a correlation between humans lack of historical memory, and lack of eruptions or BIG earthquakes in the last 50 years).
The place is simply BEAUTIFUL, if arid and hot. The wine was drinkable, as Greek winemakers have stopped putting resin (for Retsina) in their wines.
Note my daughter wearing here Vietnam hat! These villages are all about 900 or more feet up in the a cliff, all cut into the cliff perched precariously over the Aegean. I loved the following picture, as this a pretty silly human, she is such a relaxed person that she has to meditate in public, with a sign, and two layers of barriers blocking her off from people…find another place lady!
When I went to Greece in the early 80's there were a lot of the 'old greek guys' around. Much less now, especially on the "ritzy" islands like Santorini and Mykonos, but a few still are around, working with their donkeys taking folks up and down from the old port onto town. This site probably hasn't changed much for hundreds of years, although I am sure the road is better. The donkey smells sure haven't changed!
A great visit, spectacular, I would go back again, but for much longer than a day. Folk get villas for weeks, the vista's and villages can be addictive. But since it is a cruise ship, down a cable car (kids wanted to go down via donkey, but no thanks), back on the boat, and off to Turkey!
