Backwaters of Kerala, India

We are home, so I had a chance to edit the video I took in the backwaters of Kerala. We left at dawn and the first thing we saw, in addition to the lovely sunrise was a head sticking out of the water and a long post. A woman was diving down, fishing for muscles, using the post to show boats not to pass there. Our boatman told us the family would eat the muscles, but then sell the shells to the cement factory. It was too dark to video!
It felt a little invasive to be floating by as people were just waking up, coming out of their houses to wash themselves, their dishes and their clothes in the canal. However, our boatman's daughter, who was already dressed and ready to go to school, followed us along the path after we had a cup of coffee at their home at the end of the canal. You will see a young couple fishing in a round boat and then hear Indian music being broadcast from a temple, calling people to worship. The peace and quiet evaporated once we hit the river where there was a virtual traffic jam of houseboats. The houseboats are the big tourist draw of the canals: most people rent them overnight to spend a night on the water in a 1-3 bedroom air conditioned houseboat made in the traditional Keralan way.
Towards the end of the video you will see two short sections. In one, a woman making paneer (the closest thing to cheese in India) outside her tiny hut on the edge of a canal. She has placed many rectangular shaped boxes filled with milk out to dry. In the other a woman is washing her clothes by beating them on a rock.

Goodbye, London!

Entrance to St. Olave's cemetery on Seething Lane. Dickens called it "Grizzly Grim" because of the skulls over the arch. It wasn't destroyed in WWII like most of the church.

St. Olave's ("Grizzly Grim") cemetery where our ancestor was buried.

We haven't had much down time since we left Greece. Leaving Greece was iffy. A strike was called that was supposed to include the metro AND air traffic controllers for the very day we were to leave. The first time we walked through the Syntagma Square in front of the parlament  (if you saw footage of the demonstrations, then you saw Syntagma Square), lots of people were camped out with big banners tied from tree to tree. The atmosphere was one of discussion, not violence. The second time we went there, we happened to arrive as union groups were parading - marching with banners and chanting. We only felt alarmed when a block away, out of sight of the square, we walked past lines of bullet proof vested police, sitting on their motorcycles, waiting. We removed ourselves rapidly!
Luckily, the air traffic controllers did NOT strike that day so we got to London as planned. But what a plan! Pick up a rental car and drive to Southampton. By the time we got our luggage, patiently endured a trainee at Europecar (everything she did had to be redone at least once) it was getting dark. No map with the car! We had directions, but when you are driving on the wrong side of the road on a freeway and everyone is going 80 in the pouring rain, you make mistakes. We went the wrong way and headed east. Warning: you must make no mistakes on the M25, the ring road around London. There are turn arounds about every 20 miles.
We did arrive in Southampton at our hosts' house but the last few blocks were with a Southampton police escort. They noticed the "way we were driving" and thought the driver was either enebriated or lost.
Our hosts, Stephen and Gwyneth gave us some very welcome guidance and a map book, so the next day we went to Stonehenge! T'was magnificent, even with the busloads of other visitors. Then we went on to Winchester cathedral and stood at the grave of Jane Austin. The next day at Salsbury Cathedral an annual flower show was happening so it was mobbed by older English women with cameras. Every now and then a priest would climb up into the elevated pulpit and say a prayer.
In Cornwall, we had arranged another stay through Educators Bed and Breakfast.We were very lucky to make the acquaintance of Maureen and Tony who wined and dined us in addition to making some killer English breakfasts and a traditional Sunday roast with yorkshire pudding. We ended up staying 4 days.
 I LOVE Cornwall!! Can't wait to go back. If you haven't heard of the Eden Project, check it out on line. One man's vision: he took one of the china clay pits (quarries where the raw material for making good china comes from) and turned it into an enormous fun, educational place with giant geodesic dome greenhouses with rainforest and mediterranean climates inside.
We drove to Land's End and Tintagel, a ruin of a castle on a crag which has some claim to the Arthurian Legend. It was misty, drizzly and blustery - perfect conditions for imagining times gone past.
I'm having to skip a lot. Today is the last day and we leave shortly for our nonstop to SFO.
However, the grand finale was going to St. Olave's on Seething Lane to find evidence of our ancestor, Bartolomeo Talliaferro - (turns out there were multiple spellings). Our ancestor, his grandson, came to Virginia in 1630's.
Time to go! It's been a fantastic unforgettable voyage!

Athens pictures

Kapnikarea Church: Greek Orthodox, 10th Century AD

a store where Orthodox priests buy their robes

"Socrates' cell" is a cave at the base of the Acropolis. Might also have been Roman Baths, but most recently was used during WWII to hide the Acropolis treasures. They covered it with a concrete wall (now gone).

Parthenon

The Temple of Zeus, built by Roman Emperor Hadrian (pic taken from acropolis)

Excavation under the Acropolis Museum

ATHENS

June 11, 2011
Full day yesterday! Set the alarm, but didn't get to the Parthenon as planned at 8 - closer to 9am. However, still it made a difference- not really too crowded and not too hot. I have run into someone I know on every trip I've ever taken and I was sure the Parthenon would be the place on this trip - nope. It was an international crowd plus bored looking Greek school kids on field trips all wearing the same color t-shirt.
The view from the Acropolis is astounding - those Mycenaeans (1400 BC) really knew military "feng shui." We just came from the Pelopponese where we saw several mountain top citadels, including Mycenae. Even the ancients could not figure out how the builders moved those megaton stones into place.
Anyway, nowadays you can still see far into the Aegean Sea from the Acropolis but directly below is the sprawl of Athens. One third of Greeks live here.
If most of the friezes and high relief sculptured figures were damaged by time, looting, and war fare, how is it that we know what the Parthenon looked like? Well, we can thank Pausanias, 2nd Century AD Greek tourist who wrote descriptions and TWO artists from the 1600's who drew them before they were destroyed. So, here's a toast to travel writers and artists!!Yamas!
We went for lunch at a little funky place behind the Acropolis Museum. We were having a Rick Steves day, reading his acropolis info on my Kindle. Following his advice, we went to a hole in the wall, which was "lacking in tourists." We loved it - there was a "broad" in charge: dressed in a tight black, knee-length dress which showed off her large belly. She put the cig down to cut us a sample piece of pork off the grill (we were hooked after that), but the rest of the time her cigarette was hanging from her lips. She was a no nonsense kind of person - no gratuitous smiles. good, cheap food, and a great view of the modern museum and the acropolis behind it.

The museum did not allow photos - so I can only tell you about the MOST amazing thing - the pediment of the OLD Parthenon (7th-6th century, BC) - the one that the Parthenon that we now see replaced. . ASTOUNDINGLY, it is still has paint on it so you can understand better what it looked like in those days: the scene of two lions attaching a black bull still has black and red paint. The Athenians buried the figures (which preserved the pigment) when they decided to build a new Parthenon @ 450 BC.

And the Acropolis museum gets BIG, BIG points for a few things:
- "Archeologist to the rescue!" (my term) If you have a question, ask any security guard and he will whisper into his lapel and, voila! An archeologist with a big red badge will come running.
- Glass floors through which you can see archeologists at work underneath the museum where (naturally) they discovered an entire ancient neighborhood when they broke ground for the modern museum.

I made spaghetti for dinner and then we walked up to the Amphitheater just a few blocks from here which hosts Greek Folk Dance performances 5 night a week. Great musicians, a blind singer with a melodious voice and a large troupe of young people decked out in lovely village costumes made the evening below the waxing moon very pleasant. Those villagers really knew how to dress! Although the dances were from all over Greece, there were certain similarities - line dancing, the use of the handkerchief, the male dancer bending low and kicking high.

After it was over, we walked back through Melina Mercuri square - a tiny square with a little fountain and greenery and benches on the inside perimeter. It is surrounded by tavernas, bars, snack bars, and on the square on the sidewalks (outside of the greenery perimeter) each establishment had placed tables. At first we arrived and noticed it was quiet but that all the benches were occupied with small groups of friends. We sat for a while and enjoyed watching a husky and a black spaniel play. Then we decided to get a drink - and walked around the square - NOT A SINGLE TABLE WAS FREE. Greeks of all ages from the neighborhood were at the square, quietly talking and having a late dinner or drink.

So, staying in a neighborhood instead of a hotel zone is so much more interesting. Right now, the sounds of accordion music and singing canaries are floating through our open windows. A truck with a loudspeaker is driving by - probably a produce vendor if Athens is like other places in Greece. We are next door to an Orthodox church which rings the bells at various times during the day.

 A few days ago we were starving and very tired after a long HOT day of walking around Athens. Our petite red-headed French landlady had told us about a restaurant close to the flat. It was poorly marked with a hand lettered sign, but we walked into a narrow passage way that opened into a courtyard filled with tables, bougavillea and wine barrels. It was empty - just one couple and an older woman who motioned for us to sit down. We sat for a good long time,getting the blatant cold shoulder from the elderly waitress. Finally, the woman (probably the owner) got up from her table and brought us a menu = it was Greek to me!! I CAN read Greek now, but like a 2nd grader, sounding out each letter, but that doesn't mean I recognize the words once I have sounded them out! You may find this hard to believe, but this is the first time we have eaten in a restaurant without a Greek/English menu. It was truly a humble, neighborhood taverna.
More time elapsed and finally, the young man enjoying dinner with his girlfriend reluctantly offered to help us. First, he explained that we were too early. It was 7:30 pm - they only open for dinner, i.e., 8:30 pm. Therefore, most items on the menu were not ready.  When the waitress realized we had not intentionally committed this OBVIOUS dinnertime faux pas, she put her apron on and suddenly got into character. She was all smiles and had two English words: thank you and OK. The rest was easy.

Naxos Island, Cyclades, GreeceN

Watching the world go by, worry beads in hand.

This is a MARBLE mountain! Contemporary quarry - Naxos

Larger than life Kouros (male statue) left in ancient marble quarry

Landscape and road of Naxos - can you see our scooter?

Sunset at the Portara, the only thing still standing of Temple of Apollo built in 530 BC. Naxos in background

Hora, the capital of  Naxos from the Portara after sunset. Population: 5000. Visitors: millions.

CORRECTION: Santorini volcano blew its top between1647 and 1628 BC, not AD!

I'm in love with blue and a snail's tale

Papermache snail made out of newspaper in 7 languages

Can you tell which one is on the outside of the net?

Typical Santorini church

5.29.2011
Surrounded by blue in the Aegean, I realize that I love every shade of blue. The sky, the sea, the swimming pools, the domes of Greek Orthodox churches, the trim on every white house kind of wakes you up and then makes you relax - so much beauty!

 Getting here by ferry from Crete was easy - just one little hitch worth writing about.  After a week of traveling the island, we returned  to the same hotel in Hiraklion, the Mirabello. It was like coming home. People remembered us, we knew how to get around town, where the supermarket was,etc. When the Mirabello owner, Kostas,  found out we were going to Santorini, he told us he knew someone with a place there and he could make arrangements for us. When he told us the reasonable price and that the hotel picks up from the ferry, we said sure!  (The Santorini port is at the base of a cliff, and you either walk 580 steps, get a donkey ride, take a cable car or a taxi.) He made the arrangements and told us not to worry -  the  driver would be waiting for us, holding a name card.

The next time I saw him he asked if I could carry a package for him. I raised my eyebrows and asked," What is it, a bomb?" Here was a man I barely knew asking me to carry a package to a total stranger. One of those no-no's drummed into us at airports: do not agree to carry packages for strangers.
"Oh, no, no, no!!" he replied. "Just  a kilo of snails.They are asleep. They won't bother you."
"Sleeping snails?" I responded incredulously.
"Yes, I want to send my friend, Popi, in Santorini some snails," he confirmed. I immediately pictured Popi as an older man, a buddy from Kostas' navy days.

There ensued a lengthy conversation about all the ways to cook snails, various methods to keep them off your plants, new medicinal uses of the slime, how they "sleep" and even how to prepare my garden snails back home for consumption.
That evening he greeted me with a large plastic bag. I peered inside to find an orange plastic net bag full of "sleeping" snails (they spent the night in our bathroom -  a little fishy smelling).

On the boat the next day, I looked into the bag to find that one snail had not only woken up but had figured its way out of the net and was making its way up the side of the bag. I felt great respect for its heroic attempt at freedom.
We disembarked from the ferry and began looking for our driver. There were 20 men waving cards trying to get my attention. I walked through them and could find no one with a sign that said JARDIM. Then I realized - the Mirabello owner had meant the sign would have the name of the HOTEL on it  - but he never told us the name of the place! So I started asking the other card waving guys for Popi's hotel (I knew the snails were for Popi). They asked what town - I had no idea. Word spread (they all knew each other) and finally a lanky man came forward and said, "Mirabello?"

We followed him to a van full of six recently graduated girls from Indiana who were on a whirlwind tour of Europe.  Ten hairpin turns later the van had climbed to the top of the cliff and we had a birds' eye view of the "caldera" - what is now a bay was once a volcano that blew its top in 1650 AD. The hotel was so lovely (great pool) we assumed the girls were getting dropped off and then we'd be taken to our hovel. But the Vila Manos is where we all got out. I explained I had a package for Popi and a lovely young woman came forward and said, "I'm Popi." When I handed her the snails, she exclaimed, "Oh! From my brother!"