More adventures....

So Brandon and I are officially in Crete! After our ticket fiasco yesterday, it felt good to get on our ferry and to our cabin. I thought we might go to sleep right away, but of course we had to stay up until the boat launched, and we were right there, taking pictures and probably looking like tourists.

 

It's small, but here is our view of the Piraeus from the back of our ferry. The second picture is the other ferry with our company... big, right? I didn't know ferries got so large.

Here is the view of the city from the side of the ferry. The moon was awesome, but we weren't able to get the DSLR in time to get a picture of it. Instead, here is another city shot.

This was just outside of our ferry... From what I read on the map, it's some type of fort. We will have to check it out in the future.

Here is Heraklion from the ferry!

The next morning we woke up at 0600. The ferry docked at 0630, but by the time we both were able to shower and quickly pack up our things we were already at the port. We had a rental care waiting for us, and even though it was only 0700, we were literally the last ones off. Everyone us wasn't nearly as interested in the ferry ride as we were (there we go showing our tourist again).

We decided to drive and walk around Heraklion awhile, and find a bite to eat. Needless to say, Brandon and I are not very good at navigating through Greek towns yet... everything seems so close together, with no really distinct definition of "good parts" and "ghetto"... you just end up in one or the other. There seems to be graffiti everywhere, so Brandon and I have a hard time telling which is which.

 Here is our first official Greek food... it was pretty much a sub. But the Greek cook only asked if we liked sandwiches, and we said yes. We must be showing our tourist again.

 Some of the apartments looked decent... some didn't. I didn't take any pictures of those. Also, there are mopeds everywhere! They also DON'T obey traffic laws... so don't run them over while you're driving... or don't let them run you over when you're walking...

 This was a building in the middle of two other building which looked like they were in fairly good repair. I wonder what this used to be?

 This looks like some type of monastery in the middle of the bustling city. Wish we could have gone in or something. And it also looks like they have done some type of excavation work around/under it. We took a picture of the sign just so we can know what it was... someday, when we actually get someone to read it for us.

 

 This appears to be some type of excavation work right next to the shore...

 This was just left of the aforementioned excavation site. Very pretty. Brandon and I really enjoy all the green, because Greece in general doesn't have a lot of bright green... it feels very desert-ish.

 Here you can see a cat against the wall watching these pigeons... which were everywhere. We have seen a number of dogs and cats, which I'm assuming are strays.

 This was a nice narrow lane that we had to walk through to get back to where our car was parked. Some lanes didn't look so nice. Notice the graffiti next to the moped.

 These people are nutty parkers and drivers, Brandon and I have already have a few laughs and a number of scares out of them.

 Our Greek lunch! This is Souvlaki, which from what we understood from the gentleman, is like a gyro, without the pita. And yes, those are french fries... so crazy! They were good on it, thought... they were just good fries in general. Wouldn't mind another batch of those, yum!

 This is our bed... I took a nap almost as soon as we check in.

 Our kitchen, as viewed from our bed. It's not a big room, but it's clean.

 The view of the garden from our balcony.

 The view of the town if you look to the right from our balcony.

 The view of the sea if you look to the left from our balcony. Can't wait to find the beach! It will be my first time in the ocean!

 Our actual balcony. Again, not big, but it's nice, and Brandon and I definitely plan on spending some time out here.

 Our bathroom. We only have hot water from about 1000 to 2200 because the hot water is solar powered. 

 I just had to share these bizarre toilet handles. Well, I guess it's not really a handle, is it? It's a huge silver toilet button. The plumbing is slightly different, but it works, so who can complain?

 These are our doornobs. They don't actually turn, you press the button on the top and push or pull, depending on the door and what side you're on.

The first two squares are the light switches in our room... and throughout the hotel. They're pretty much like regular light switches, except gigantic in size.

The third square is the outlet. Thank goodness we got an adapter for our things.

The fourth square is how we get electricity. We have this magnet thing on our key chain, and if we want the electricity to work, we need to "plug it in". I guess it somehow completes a circuit. 

 

 

 Here is part of our hotels garden! It's really beautiful. You can't quite see it, but there is a picnic table under those trees in the middle of the first picture. Oh, and there are flowers everywhere! Different shades of pink, purple, white, red, orange, yellow, not just here, but all over the island! They are so pretty! But I won't be taking pictures of every flower I see... At least I don't plan on it...

 Are those kumquats? There also looks to be lemon and clementine trees around this area. I really want to pick them and find out... wonder if I would get into trouble...

 The pool! It's huge! And beautiful! They have so many nice pool chairs to sit in, a bar right next to the pool (which doesn't appear open this time of the year), a little tree-island which I'm not sure what it's purpose is... and it gets to 4 meters deep, taller than Brandon!

 Here we are reading and tanning... we read and napped the whole afternoon here. Pretty lazy day! We are still suffering a little from jet lag.

 Here is the back of our hotel. I will have to get a front picture some time soon.

 Driving in our rental car! We are actually on the ride side of the car, and the right side of the road... and by right side I mean left side of the car on the right of the road. Just like at home. So at least Brandon doesn't have to worry about accidentally driving in the wrong lane.

 Brandon and I did NOT know what to make of Greek driving when we first started out. In this picture you can see two cars ahead of us... in the same lane, with a car coming towards them in the opposite lane. Cars are constantly driving on the white line, or completely on the right side of the white line. Brandon started to drive this away after we were passed multiple times on a curvy road with double yellow lines. As you can see above, Greeks have no problem getting into the oncoming traffic lane in order to pass. Oncoming traffic doesn't seem to think much about it either and just keep driving on their white line. And we still can't figure out what some of the signs mean... We didn't know what a speed limit sign looked like, but we figured it out.

 Those brown bush looking shrubs were interesting. It would be fun to have some type of horticulture/botany book to identify some of these plants.

 Crete is very hilly and mountainous. It also has a lot of sheer walls made of some type of red stone. These don't look very solid or sturdy, and there are a few falling rock caution signs.

 I think there are quite a few monasteries on the island. This seems like a perfect little perch for one. Very majestic.

Well that's it so far for our first day of Crete! It's late now, after 2300, so I think it's high time for bed. Goodnight!