We have never had problems during our mid to late May excursions with things being closed. Obviously because of COVID there are a lot of business in in Greece taking their time with re-opening. Today we discovered there are archaeological sites on certain islands that do not open until later in the season, and this makes no sense to me at all. Later on this.
Today was explore Naxos bi-car day, which is always exciting, because we use a map and actually explore every crevasse that we can. Got a great sleep, had a wonderful hotel breakfast and hopped in the car towards town to buy fredo americanos and hit the road.
I mapped out the trip before hand thing we’d make the big swing around the north shore of the island and then head down the east coast and then hit the middle of the island around lunch time.
Everything actually went as planned, we had the road to ourselves, which is always good on tiny little island roads, went past two huge damns for fresh water on the island and eventually came to the northern most coast and hooked a right to our first Kouros, large stone figures carved out of marble, for which the island is known for, that for some reason were left behind. This one at Apolona was the largest.
We then headed up the mountains and passed through many pretty valleys, villages and coastal roads
before finding the center of the island and the famous town of Chalki, which is known as the center for distillation of the local liquor made from the citron, a cross between an orange and a lemon, with a thick rind and mostly only growing on this island. I took a picture of julia with one or size, though they tell us, this one that she is holding is 1/2 the size of a mature one.
So anyways, we walked through the town, there are hiking trails all over the this area, so we followed a bunch of signs but didn’t really find anything. Ultimately we stopped for lunch at a super cute cafe and all was well.
The next step of the journey was to find the ancient quarries and supposedly 2 more Kouros, and we needed to get moving before all the carbs we had for lunch knocked us out like a light. Follow the directions of no one, we found the town that supposedly had the answers, and a sign that seemed to point the way, and a tiny road that looked promising, that suddenly turned in the gravel road from hell, and wound around the top of this giant hill, and nearly killed our car, as it kept bottoming out on the road, and eventually came straight down the hill and low and behind, into a perfectly final and paved parking lot. We stil have no fucking clue what just happened.
Following the signs we walked down the path to the first Kouros which was upside down and left behind because its let broke off.
The other Kouros was supposed to be down the path, but we missed the sign and wound up off the path and down a dry creek bed for probably 1/2 an hour before we realized we were going the wrong direction. We headed back the way we came and found the buried sign leading to the 3 Kouros, which was nothing more than a block of marble laying on the ground.
Finished with the quarry, we say a sign for the ancient sanctuary, but let me tell you right now, not only did we not find it, but I hope it burns in Greek hell for nothing being where it was supposed to be according to this lame ass signs. We found a part of a Greek aqua duct instead, but this should have been the sanctuary instead.
Fuck that sanctuary, seriously.
After the debacle at the quarry, we thought we try an easy one, heading south over the mountain and through a bunch of villages toward the sanctuary of Dionysus. This was a no brainer, follow the signs, and go see the damn thing. We pulled up as two beautiful French persons stood next to their car staring up at the locked gate. I got out of the car and walked up to the locked gate in disbelieve. The girl of the two beautiful French people said “fermé” and julia who knows a little French said, it’s closed ,and I said THIS IS BULLSHIT! And the beautiful French people chuckled, because they know stupid Americans will never be satisfied with this mortal coil. I took a picture from the gate anyways, out of spite. We found out later the outdoor shit with guards and museums are not yet open on Naxos because it is not yet season for them yet. Seriously?
We took one final excursion to the area should of Naxos Town, which had a lot of fab hotels and pretty beaches, but this was really just to kill time.
Back to the glorious Astrid of Naxos were we chatted it up with one of the owner ladies and her cousin Sunday who worked Sundays for aunt. We had lots of good conversations before the recommended a place for dinner and we headed into town were we had a wonderful dinner and the owner promised me a t-shirt tomorrow before we leave. I have a thing about tshirts from awesome Greek restaurants, so far, Mavros Gatos is the only place that has come through.
Back to bed kids, we’ve got 4 more hours to explore tomorrow before our boat ships out at 1:30 for Syros.
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