We arrived in Heraklion, on Crete’s northern coast, and then drove down a winding road to our hotel. We had, quite smartly, chosen to rent a car. The Island of Crete is extremely rocky, so much so that at first glance it would seem uninhabitable. But this has been Crete’s great advantage throughout the ages, making it hard to invade. For this reason it was home to one of great early civilizations: Minos. Plus, the rocky areas are one of the things that make the island so beautiful. 

Our hotel was on the top of a hill, so the ground was inclined and there were small sets of stairs to get from one part of the hotel to another. A steep path led down to a beach, where we went the next morning. It was cluttered with tourists, including many young children. We relaxed on the beach for a couple of hours, and then went to one of the restaurants that faced the water. After we finished our lunch the waiter gave us four cups of Raki, the Crete alcoholic drink that is stronger than vodka. 

We decided to spend the rest of our day in the Palace of Knossos. In 1900, Sir Arthur John Evans excavated a grand Minoan palace. He was so excited that he proceeded to partially reconstruct the place, expending 32 years and hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money. This greatly annoyed professional archeologists, but made the palace extremely popular among tourists and other common folks. 

The reconstruction was very cool, but it was difficult to differentiate between the actual palace and the imagination of Mr. Evans. There were some amazing frescos, also mostly reconstructed, dating back to the time when the palace was open and active. 

After we were done with the palace, we rushed off to the archeology museum. We had limited time left in the day, so we had to hurry before it closed, and when we got there we only had an hour. The museum had a breathtaking collection of artifacts from all sides of ancient Minoan life, from trade to frescos, from some of the first writing in the world to jewelry. Many items came from the Palace of Knossos. Some of the stuff was nigh perfectly preserved, like a set of caskets with drawings on them. We had to leave before we could see the entire museum, but we still loved it. We had planned to spend 2 days in southern Crete, and so, the next morning, we packed up and prepared to switch to a hotel named Monucus Monucus (which happens to be the scientific name of the mediterranean monk seal). But before that, we went on a hike in Imbros Gorge, one of many deep canyons that fall into the ocean on the south coast of Crete. We saw wild goats, which is to be expected because Crete is full of goats. However, these goats seemed somehow happier than the domesticated goats we saw later. As we neared the end of the gorge the sun was setting and we were surprised to see a really fit runner going in the other direction. 

After the hike was over, we took a taxi to our car. We were driving down to our apartment when we noticed the runner we had seen earlier going up the hill.  We gave him a lift back to his hotel. He was from Vienna, Austria, but he had been to many places in Europe and some in the U.S, which he told us about. We dropped him off, but before we went to our new apartment we went to the very bottom of the hill to eat dinner. There were tons of restaurants, many with fresh caught fish and seafood. We couldn’t decide what to eat, so we went out to the rocks and thought about what it would be like to kayak in and have dinner there. Then we ate a delicious dinner and went to our apartment for the night. 

Our apartment was near the town of Sfakia, which had a marked history of resistance to the Venetian and Ottoman empires that occupied Crete for most of the Second Millennium. We saw signs of this several times on our journey. On one occasion, Daddy and I stopped to see an ancient fort, while Mommy and Natalia went to an art museum.  The fort, already well defined by Crete’s rocky coast, was still intact, and might still be a good hiding place in case of an alien invasion. It had been taken over by the Ottomans, who had constructed a mosque in its center. The Ottomans tried, and failed, to convert the Greeks to Islam, often violently. 

An exhibit from the art museum had been put in the mosque for no apparent reason. Wondering why, we went to ask the women who oversaw the building and the exhibit. We struck up an extremely interesting conversation with her about Greek politics. She had been a teacher, but because of the economic crisis she was out of work even though she was very well educated. We talked about the cruelty of the creditors, how the Greeks “cooked the books” to get into the European Union (something that everyone knew at the time), and the ongoing negotiations over the Greek debt. In particular, she lauded Yanis Varoufakis, the Greek finance minister. (I will state my opinions on all of these things in the background on Europe section of the blog).

We also visited another fort. Most of it was ruins, but there was a tower that was remarkably intact.  According to historical fact and local legend, the fort had been built by the Venetians to fortify their control of Sfakia. Every day workers would be sent in, and every night the locals tore down what they had built. To stop this, the Venetians hung the Pastos brothers for being responsible. Later,in 1828, a great battle occurred at the castle, with the Ottomans crushing a Greek revolt. Based on another myth, the shadows of those who lost their lives in the battle can be seen marching at dawn.

After looking at the remains of what were once walls, we went into the wooden castle in the back. It had a square hole in the middle  and on the walls were paintings of Sfakian life. We went to the top, which had an amazing view of the nearby beach and the required flag. Back at the bottom, there was a table exhibiting a type of weaving unique to Sfakia.  

One afternoon, we decided to see what it was like to live in Crete. One of the problems we encountered on the trip was that we didn’t get to meet that many local people and see their way of life as much as we would have liked. So we decided to visit one of the local Cretan villages. We drove the incredibly windy and high road up hill to the village. Along the sides there were beautiful flowers. The road was quite narrow, and we could turn around only with great difficulty. The roads in Crete are some of the best roads I’ve ever ridden on, even though we heard that they were built fairly recently, in the past decade or so. For that reason, driving through the towns can be weird, as they weren’t made to have roads in them. On the left side of the road, many houses were built on the side of the cliff. We walked up the right side to explore the village. This side went up the hill, and we saw a pair of goats in a cage, several churches (for one small village), and a school. There were several people, but they only spoke Greek, so we couldn’t communicate with them. Still, it was very nice to see a small Cretan village. We got back in our car and drove up an incredibly steep and winding road to the top of a mountain. We came upon a quaint little cafe in the middle of nowhere. It was decorated with lamb skulls and sold many things like herbs, honey, and raki. We got a lemonade, and talked to some of the people there. At the very top of the hill there was another village, with a shop and some homes. The next day we headed back north over the mountains to Heraklion and on to Athens.

-Isaiah

Cappadocia, in central Turkey, was a quiet heaven compared to Istanbul. Until of course, you hear the mosques at 4:30AM. Prayers flow through the speakers five times a day, every day. At some point you get so used to them, you stop and go “okay, any minute now…”

Turks in Cappadocia don’t mess around with breakfast: Three kinds of cheese, bread, butter, nutella, cucumbers, tomatoes, eggs, olives, halva, and tea all on separate plates. From our breakfast balcony we could see crops being grown on the hills and strange rock formations in the distance. The land seemed to go on forever, dirt roads that could take you to the end of the earth.

We walked out of town and onto a dirt path that led us into the hills and valleys, towards the hidden caves and crevices. In Rose Valley, we explored rooms and houses built into the side of mountains – some were filled with wall paintings and scratches from hundreds of years ago. There were windows cut into the walls, surrounded by colorful paintings. Cappadocia was a center of early Christianity and is famous for its ancient churches carved into the rocks. We found a peaceful two-story church carved into a stone outcropping and were able to explore its small rooms and large sanctuary.

Later we climbed down a ladder to a little restaurant hidden in the hills. It had small stools surrounding long picnic tables, and blankets and pillows were spread out on rocky alcoves shaded by wide pieces of fabric. We were served salad, lentil soup, manti (Turkish ravioli), and watermelon. Isaiah found a path that lead down to a creek, covered by a massive rock formation. It acted like a low ceiling, and made everything pitch black.

Hiking up to the top of the trails, you could see the weird, vertical rock formations making patterns in the distance. Some of these rocks are called “fairy chimneys” and are made when wind erodes the rocks into tall pillars, with wider more rounded tops. Wildflowers covered the fields around us and bordered the trail, bringing color to the tan background. Grape trees dotted the hillsides. It was the crazy dust storms that made us shield our eyes and finally hurry back towards the hotel.

We spent our second day in Pigeon Valley, named after the thousands of pigeon houses carved into the rock walls. It was much greener and denser than our other hike, but we still found caves to crawl into, and wildflowers covered the grassy meadows around us. About halfway through the walk, we went down the wrong path, and were guided back to the right trail by a local who was showing the way to another couple out hiking .We walked the rest of the trail back to the town of Goreme with them, talking about where we had traveled and giving them advice about Istanbul.The man who owned the hotel we stayed at insisted that we go to a certain restaurant for dinner. You have to make a reservation the day before you come, so they can start cooking your food—Testi Kebap, a stew-type dish cooked in a clay pot—for three to four hours. They break open the pot at your table and pour it onto your plate. It’s delicious, and definitely one of the best meals we had in Cappadocia. The restaurant we went to had about eight different spices on the table, and our waiter showed us which spices to put on each of the dishes.

By far the best part of our trip was the hot air balloon ride! There are 25 different balloon companies, and about 100 hot air balloons fly every day. The first day we woke up at 4am and waited an hour and a half only to be told it was too windy to fly. Day two was completely booked – all 25 companies. We FINALLY made it into the air on day three!! A van picked us up at 4:30am and took us to a massive open area where people were standing around in the half dark drinking coffee and eating pastries. Balloons lay on the ground, about to be airborne. We were given tags with numbers on them, and when our number was called, we rushed with 15 other people to our bright red balloon. We huddled together for a photo, and then climbed into the sturdy basket. The baskets are divided into five parts – two on each side for the passengers, and one in the middle for the pilot. Our balloon slowly started to fill with air, and fire shot up into its center. As we started to lift off the ground, we could see other balloons gaining height all around us.

The view from the balloon is incredible! You can see fields and rock formations for miles, and the houses look like Lego pieces from so high up in the sky. Far below you can see white vans driving down the roads, following their company’s balloons by radio. But seeing all the other balloons in the sky is even more amazing then the landscape. They are all different colors, and because they are steered entirely by the wind, some are way above you, and some are so low they look like they are touching the trees. The sun rose as we flew, and the balloons flying in the morning rays of sun was an incredible sight to see. We landed right next to a grove of trees, and I was so sure that the bottom of the basket would hit the trees. Our pilot somehow managed to land us perfectly onto the back of a truck, and the basket was latched to the bed of the truck. We climbed out and they set up a round folding table, popping champagne bottles in celebration (a long-practiced tradition in balloon riding).

-Natalia

We arrived in Istanbul a mere week before the Turkish elections. In the city, we saw tons of party flags hanging in long rows. We even saw a truck with a picture of the prime minister, and anther truck filled with people waving party flags.

In the morning we got up and decided to look around. The main street was filled with people. It wasn’t really a street, because it was no different from the sidewalk (other than the fact it was darker and wider), and because only a complete idiot would drive a car on it. Walking was faster. Down the middle of the street ran a trolley. There were stands with Turkish bread and water that somehow stayed cool, and people blowing bubbles on the street and playing instruments, but other than that there were fewer people selling stuff on the street than we had seen in other countries. Off the main road, Istanbul was like a maze. There were alleys that you could walk down. These had actual streets with tons of interesting stores.

At one point we came to a stand which was run by the Kurdish party, or HDP (Peoples Democratic Party). There was some difficulty communicating, but, based on what we were able to make out and what we discovered later, we learned that the party was trying to appeal to progressives in order to get more than 10% of the vote. You see, in Turkey, a party has to get 10% or more of the vote to get any seats at all in the parliament. Also, a party can be banned if it is accused of being separatist. This fate befell the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party). That party has been in conflict with the Government of Turkey for decades.   The Kurds are a group of people who want autonomy. However, unlike other separatist groups, they are split between Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Syria.

We also saw a protest in the street.  We had seen people gathering in one corner, so we watched what was happening. About a hundred people were gathered together in a square formation. All of them held signs of relatives who had been “disappeared” by the Turkish Government, along with their names and the dates when they vanished, which were in the 80s and 90s. The ones in the front were kneeling, while the ones in the back were standing, so you could see all the signs at once. A woman in the front gave a speech, but it was in Turkish so we couldn’t understand it. We had seen Turkish police a little ways off, but they didn’t disturb the demonstration.

Later we came across a large group of women dancing in the street. They took up the whole street and for a while they had to wait to begin dancing until a garbage truck passed. They danced Flamenco, from Spain, and many people gathered around to watch and take photos.

The Turks we met seemed really proud about their food. For example, we found a good Turkish restaurant. When we ordered our food, the owner came over and explained that he had lived in New York for many years, but had decided to come back to Turkey to open a Turkish restaurant. He said that there were no good Turkish restaurants in New York, but he told us what the best non-Turkish ones were. Similarly, we later met a man working at a food stand in front of a national park in central Turkey. He was a skilled chef who had worked at restaurants all over Europe, but had moved back to Turkey to open up a restaurant of his own. But that didn’t work out. He had a hard time getting the money and ingredients necessary to start the restaurant. Nevertheless, he still had plans to do it.

On the top of our list of sights to see in Istanbul was the Hagia Sophia (Ayasofyia in Turkish). The Sophia was a church, constructed in 537 C.E., that had been turned into a mosque in 1453. It contained signs of both Christianity and Islam, from the giant Arabic seals to the Christian mosaics on the upper levels. Parts were under repair, but it was still amazing. There were signs with information like in a museum, and it contained many interesting parts like a royal library and a wishing column that is said to cure illnesses.

Then we headed to the Blue Mosque. When we arrived it was closed for prayer. Outside, there was a Egyptian Obelisk. We could go into the courtyard, where many people were waiting. According to the rules, all people had to cover their legs and women had to cover their heads. The mosque itself was spacious and beautiful. It had a red carpet floor and lights above our heads. It didn’t have much else, as is common with mosques, but it did have an Islamic information center on the side, where people could talk to an Imam and have their questions answered.

We also went to see a bazaar. A bazaar is similar to a mall, except all the shops are small and open-air. It has existed in the Mediterranean for centuries. The one we saw had shops that sold jewelry, clothing, and trinkets, but it still had the same design as ancient bazaars. There was also a bazaar that sold spices, dried fruit, and candy. Like most places in Istanbul, it was filled with people. It is amazing that bazaars can still thrive in the modern world.

We went to two great art museums, Istanbul Modern, which was a large building along the water and had a really interesting exhibit on famous photographs from the 20^th Century; and a smaller contemporary art museum in the Pera neighborhood.We liked Istanbul better than we had expected. The city was packed with people; this was actually one of the reasons we liked the city so much. Even though it was the first Muslim place we visited, with the exception of a stopover in Jakarta, it was fairly secular. It had managed to keep many of its traditions, like bazaars, while developing its economy. Turks seemed proud of their culture, as we saw with food. One of the things we have seen on our trip, especially in Europe, is a deep sense that the place we are in has been inhabited for centuries. Finally, we realized that the location of hotel made a big difference. Getting hotel in a residential area of Istanbul, rather than the tourist area near the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia, made a big difference in our experience of the city.

-Isaiah