day 8 and the rain shall wash away your shoes

we got up early, as we tend to do, the area around the Faros was loud all night long, so JG didn't sleep so well, but I finally felt like my jet lag was over with, and was ready to try to beat the rain that threatened to make short of our plans on the island.  we wandered some more in the old town, eventually finding bakery and buying some breakfast before heading out on the road towards Armani, which had an ancient Minoan cemetery.  we passed it twice before realizing where it was and then found out it didn't open up until 10.  boo on that.  but we befriended a cute kitten, and had a number of french people come by trying to get in and not believing us when we told them it opened at 10, and going down and looking at the sign themselves before coming back up and leaving, ugh, and then a giant bus showed up full of, you guessed it, old bikers, ugh, and then finally the guy in charge, and we got to go in.  now imagine you walk into an open area, with all of these very old trees, and everywhere on the ground, are these slits, cut into the limestone, and every slit is a grave.  it was just awe-inspiring.  some of them were no more than a little hole, some enormous, you could walk down these stairs cut into the stone and actually walk into the hole, and stand up inside.  there were over 200 of them on this small hillside, and outside the fenced in area, there were even more.  it was simply amazing.

the sky was bright and almost blue and we wondered, where was the rain?  we needed to do laundry, so we hopped in the car, got on the road towards Heraklion.  from there it was an hour drive and made it downtown to our hotel to drop off our laundry.  there was still no rain, so we got back in the car and headed south towards Arhanes, where supposedly there were some cool sights to see.  we had lunch at a lovely little taverna,

and then went find Fournes, which was supposed to be another cemetery.  after following the signs, the road lead to a deadens, and we walked up a steep trail to find a gate that was locked.

ugh.  we drove around the town looking for more things, finding nothing, so i suggested the heraklion natural history museum.  it was a pretty neat place, outlining the local animals and plants and on the hour they had an earthquake simulator, which was quite impressive.  they had some giant dinosaur reproductions, and even a stuffed Cretan Cat, which JG is now infatuated with.  after the museum we dropped off the car at the airport and the lovely man drove us back to the Marin Dream.  from there we check on the laundry, not done, and walked down to the towns harbor to check out the newly opened Koules, a giant castle like structure at the head of the harbor.  it was pretty cool.

from there we decided to walk to our dinner destination, nearby, and made close friends with the waiter, as normally happens, lots of RAKI and hugs and pictures, and then we headed back to the hotel, stopping briefly at the first restaurant we ate at in Heraklion, and talking with the cook who was actually a Canadian Greek, who was pretty hilarious, i promise you, it was funny as hell, and then without warning, it started to rain like a cow pissing on a flat rock.  we shimmied up the alley way and then as soon as it came, it was gone and we were back safe and sound at the Marin Dream.  tomorrow we leave Crete and head off to the islands, where it's supposed to be 70 degrees every day, so i doubt much swimming or such things will be done.  ugh.  love you.