Aegean Odyssey Day 15 (Santorini)

Visited two museums, foot-and-hand-washed laundry in the bathtub, tried to do some writing and updating of my blogs while being plagued throughout the day by bad Internet connection and difficulty keeping the computer powered up, and had a gyro each for first and second dinner. 

After breakfast we walked up through town to the vicinity of the museums I wanted to visit. When we arrived at the Archaeological museum Diane confided that, with only 56 hours until our departure from Santorini, she was "concerned about the laundry" and we both agreed it would be best if she went back to the hotel to work on it. My guess is that she had glanced into the foyer of the museum when we walked past it the day before and recalled that it was dominated by pots, certainly the sort of antiquity she hates the most. 

Archaeological Museum
To say that I was a bit disappointed with the museum is not to diminish the many wonderful things its two halls, configured in an L-shape, contained. It is the only museum I have visited on this trip, however, where I was provided with no brochure or other guiding information, and about half the items were not labeled in any way, leaving visitors to guess at their provenance and somewhat uncertainly figure things out on their own; there did not even appear to be a guidebook available for sale. 


In general, a preponderance of the artifacts dated to the 7th and 8th century B.C. and were from local ancient cemeteries. Certainly the most striking and beautiful of the objects was the lifelike bust of the goddess Aphrodite (above), which still retained much of the pigment that had been used to color her hair. Other things I particularly enjoyed were the ceramic items with depictions of birds eating snakes, a theme that appears to have predominated in the iconography of local grave goods from this period; and some humorous and even somewhat vulgar statuettes that appeared to have been in vogue for a time, such as a satyr mounted on a fat little donkey that almost could have been the model for the one in Shrek. 

I love artifacts like these because of the connections they make for us with the past and the sorts of questions they prompt. How did someone feel about the person they buried this with? What would I want to be buried with? Contemplating these ancient peoples in this way always makes me quite emotional and I hope part of them knows that they are being remembered and mourned anew. 

Santozeum
Located just a half block down the hill from the Archaeological Museum and apparently situated in what had once been a large private residence is the Santozeum, a museum dedicated to full-sized reproductions of frescoes discovered in the ruined city of Akrotiri. Upon entering visitors are provided with a laminated booklet that provides a crash course in Theran wall paintings and which explains the iconography of those on exhibit; there is also a brief video with interviews with the Princeton archaeologists involved with the restoration of the frescoes. One of the most impressive of the works is certainly that depicting the extended sea voyage of a Minoan fleet from the 2nd millennium B.C., which includes representations of four different Bronze Age seaports. As with the nearby Museum of Prehistoric Thira, a visit to the Santozeum complements one to the archaeological dig at Akrotiri and helps make a trip to it complete. 

When I got back to the hotel Diane dumped some soap and two weeks worth of my laundry into the tub and, after letting it soak in hot water for around half an hour, I got in and stamped around on it for about 10 minutes before working each piece a little by hand. Seemed very reminiscent of pictures I have seen of people stomping grapes for wine and made me wonder if anyone would ever discover a fresco at Akrotiri that would get dubbed "Washerwomen of Thera"; asked Diane to take a picture for posterity but she declined. Then, as I wrung out each piece Diane rinsed it in the sink, wrung it out again, and then found a place to hang it on one of our two balconies. I don't think it was too obtrusive but, suffice it to say, the hotel won't be using any pictures of it taken this afternoon for its new brochure. 

Headed out to find somewhere casual to eat and, after wandering around lower Fira a little, rejected one place because it looked "too hot" and another probable-looking establishment simply because it was named "Meat Corner." Finally stopped at a gyros shop called McDaniel's Snack Bar, where Diane had a pork gyros and I had a lamb kebab pita, both good, along with a couple of cans of Coke Light (hours later I was hungry again and wandered a few streets down to Nick the Grill, where I had a delicious lamb gyro that had a nice hot blob of fat in it). 

Watched the sun set over the caldera from our terrace while the crowds milled below and cheered as it descended beneath the horizon, a tradition that irritates Diane (and which is, admittedly, a little strange; for time immemorial people have celebrated the rising of the sun and even gone to great pains to ensure it would happen, and this is certainly a new spin on that). Then, I went downstairs to the "Colonial Room" and ordered a cup of coffee. I chatted with the barman, Giorgio from Athens, while he went through the prolonged process and learned he was working at the hotel for the season and very much liked Santorini. 

"There are many islands," Giorgio said. "There is only one Santorini." 

Aegean Odyssey Day 14 (Santorini)

Sadly, today was our last day with Richard and Laura! A week with them went by pretty quickly and was over too soon. 

We met for breakfast at 10 a.m. and, as it was damp on the terrace of the Atlantis Hotel, we ate inside for the first time since we arrived. Richard and Laura checked out right at 11 and then we moved their luggage into our room for the day and, after chatting awhile, realized we still needed a picture of all of us on our premium balcony. I approached the desk clerk, who was hanging around by the bar entrance, and he seconded a guest who was having a cup of coffee there for the task. I lined up the shot and even took a sample (top right), but somehow the settings got changed after I handed over the camera and the one with all four of us did not come out quite as crisp (below right). 


We then decided to head out and wander around Fira a bit, heading up to the area of the cable car that goes down to the port and scouting the locations of two of the three museums in Fira I still wanted to visit, the one for Classical antiquities and the Zantozeum. After circling back toward the hotel on a side street that took us past the Highlander -- where Richard and I resisted the urge to step in for a quick one -- we decided to have a bite at Ampelos, the place we had met the Allans for our first drink of the vacation with them a week earlier. I had a delicious artichoke heart stew with peas, carrots, potatoes, and Santorini tomatoes, while Diane had a Caesar salad, Laura had the fresh fried calamari, and Richard enjoyed a pork "Slovaki." We induced the waiter to shoot a brief video segment of us giving our famous "Yamas, Ya' Bas'!" toast, which was one of the trademark watchwords of our vacation together (bottom). While we were sitting there, we were amused to look over at the Naoussa Restaurant and see one of its waiters escorting customers from the nearly-empty terrace down the outer stairway toward the vault we had been taken to! Someone else apparently had not measured up to the stringent standards they expect of paying guests. 

We spent the rest of the afternoon drinking water and wine on our terrace at the hotel and, among other things Richard and I agreed in principal that we were overdue to embark on some sort of project together and would look at doing so once he completed his doctorate and I had cleared my slate a bit. We put the Allans in a cab to the airport at 7:30 and wished them a safe, speedy, and comfortable journey home, where they were looking forward to several days of primitive camping in the sunless and drizzly hills of their rugged homeland.  

Around 8:30 I went and got us some takeout from Chinese Famous Foods a few blocks away. Suffice it to say that this restaurant has zero ambience but I had a nice chat with Orestes, the young Albanian/Greek guy that takes orders for the older Chinese men that run the establishment; among other things, I learned that Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant had visited Santorini by yacht last year and that he had gotten his picture taken with them.  And, lack of ambience aside, we were pleased to discover that the food was excellent and thoroughly enjoyed our numbers 1, 24, 43, and 53 (hot and sour soup, pork with mushrooms and bamboo shoots, stir-fried noodles with vegetables, and fried rice).

Dozed for a couple of hours while the thoroughly mediocre street musician that has plagued us this week droned out the handful of songs he knows, again and again, for about three hours over by the bell tower of the Greek Orthodox cathedral; waited in vain for Bono to arrive and slap him with an injunction preventing him  from continuing to ruin With or Without You. Then, got up, worked and played my Grepolis computer game for about three hours, and then had a beer on the terrace and turned in.