The Ever Present Chair for takin it all in

It seems that wherever we find an unusually beautiful spot there is a plastic chair in the midst of it. Kinda weird...but then again...not strange at all. Makes perfect sense.

Huge Wildflower

This wildflower is twice as tall as my hand .

It's Greek to me

Village at end of canyon

End of the canyon trail

More wildflowers

Pervolakia town

Canyon hike

Wild herbs everywhere.

Gorge hike today

OMG.... This was such a magical day. We hiked the Pervolakia Gorge bottom to top and hiked back to our car. We're tired but really happy. This place is like heaven. Wildflowers everywhere and very friendly people.
The whole island of Crete smells like an herb garden.

Goats, Goats, Goats

Goats in shrine. Greek Priorities!
Tomorrow we leave Agia Palagia and begin a backpacking trip through a high plain loaded with wildflowers. We are very excited (and a little uncertain) but are excited about ditching the car and striking out on foot with just our packs.

Sheep and goats in church

Stairs to Everywhere

From Knossos looking toward the countryside. Fields and fields of herbs and those funny bumps at the top of the hill are olive trees of course.

Breakfast

Gordon and Dionysis chatting it up over breakfast in the garden.

In the Garden

Basically the whole island of Crete is a beautiful garden. Here I am in Ireni's garden with the master gardener herself. Ireni co-owns our sweet hotel with her husband Dionysis here in Agia Palagia. She has huge oregano plants, basil, succulent cactus and of course geraniums of all colors growing like wonderful weeds up all the walls and down all the stairs. We feel like family here. Dionysis just offered us a drink of his father's home-made Raki, a local equivalent of baccanora or moonshine.

More Wisteria !

3000 year old Minoan pottery shards

We spent most of the day at The ancient Minoan site of Knossos. Way too many people (spring break) but really fascinating mostly because of the pottery shards EVERYWHERE on the ground. We walked over these and realized that they were from the early Minoan culture from about 1800 BCE. People were just walking over them without even looking down. What's wrong with all these folks.

Fig Tree

This was the biggest fig tree Gordon and I have ever seen. It was in the ancient Minoan archaeological site of Knossos. There were hundreds of tiny figs all over the tree.

Dinner tonight

The glass of yellow liquid is a local red wine (?) Pretty damn good and a pretty good buzz.
Dinner: Greek salad, and gyros. This restaurant was very local and affordable. Yum mm

Agia Palagia Cove

Yes, that really is the color of the water. Mind boggling landscape.

Tonight

Wildflowers everywhere

Tiny, sweet mountain flowers

Gordon and I took a walk down a rocky cliff to the sea and saw at least 30 species of delicate wildflowers. Absolutely breath-taking.

Wild Poppies

These brilliant red poppies grow wild along the roads and in the olive groves.

A gia Palagia cove

Cozy Beach

We spent some time today mapping out a backpacking trip we want to take when we leave Agia Pelagia.

Millions more flowers

OMG ! Crete

We arrived in Iraklion from Athens late last night and rented a car to get to Agia Palagia, a small beach and farming town....did I mention that it's gorgeous here with wild flowers in profusion tumbling down to the beaches everywhere and small rocky coves with sweet, intimate beaches. Locals have lush flower gardens and vegetables of all varieties growing. Geraniums are sort of wild here. They seem to like the climate here. THe folks who own our small hotel are very sweet. Even with our late arrival last night they insisted that share a welcome drink and munch with them. I had a glass of wine in honor of our host...yes, his name is Dionysis!

25 million seeds

Ai Wei Wei's installation of millions of hand cast and painted sunflower seeds at the Tate Modern Museum in London. Awesome show.

An explanation of Ai Wei Wei's sunflower seed Installation

25 Million porcelain sunflower seeds

Ai Wei Wei, the Chinese activist artist's installation at the Tate Modern Museum.... Some 25 million lifelike sunflower seeds, each one cast from porcelain clay and hand painted by Chinese people from a village known for it's it expertise in porcelain work. A mind boggling exhibit. Ai Wei Wei was detained April 12 by the Chinese government for his "subversive" artistic activities.

Decollatage

I think mine is juicier than the queen's. But that's just me.

Sacchi Gallery

Pretty ---____ing scary!

Kate and William

are everywhere. Souvenir opportunities abound. Put in your order soon.

David

Guess who we saw today? A replica but awesome anyway.

More Wisteria

Wisteria Everywhere......Gorgeous

The Bailey Hotel Lobby

Kim on the stairway to our room.

More Sacchi Gallery

This is an actual dragonfly with minature passengers created by the artist. An amazing sculpture.

At the Sacchi Gallery

Yes, that is a mink coat on the head of the horse sculpture. This has been one of our favorite galleries so far...oh and the Tate Modern. We saw an amazing Joan Mi'ro retrospective last night at the Tate and an equally incredible installation by the activist Chinese artist, Ai Wei Wei.

Solar Queen

At the amazing Sacchi Gallery today we stopped and had a cappuccino and a moment with the Queen, our newest acquisition. If you look closely you'll notice that her purse is a tiny solar panel which powers her perpetually waving hand. As you can imagine we had lots of laughs over her. As did the folks sitting next to us.

London Street Scene

Hyde Park tulips

For some reason I thought we"d be early for the flower season in London. NOT!
Absolutely gorgeous everywhere we look. We're off to an urban wetlands today and the Sachi Gallery. More later

Shoes?

Shoes,shoes, shoes. Oh dear God don't let me buy a pair. They just won't work in the sandy beaches of Crete.

The Wedding and a Royal Spotting

London is FAB FAB FAB but sucking our wallets dry and the trip has just begun!
Oh well, never mind....every pound spent has been worth it.

List of activities thus far on Day 2.5
- Saw THE QUEEN pass by on Cromwell St on her birthday yesterday! For real.
We're staying in her 'hood so I guess she's entitled. She was wearing a lovely shade of blue
And a horrid hat.

- Went to Hyde Park and watched the swans in a pond. The lilacs are in full bloom and the country is having unseasonably warm/sunny
weather. The whole country is out laying in the sun and turning very pink. I guess we can put our raincoats away. Yay . Saw a Nancy Spero show in a small art gallery in the middle of the park.

- went to the Victoria and Albert Museum . Unreal. Saw one of Leonardo's sketchbooks , a special showing of contemporary African photographers and a show of an amazing Japanese fashion designer....not to mention a jewelry show that spanned 3 centuries. Note to self .... Must go back to see the other 5 floors of art.

- There are lots of street performing artists in London. The street scene in general is fabulous.
- we'll be seeing the award winning musical play War Horse today in the theater district. I'll let you know how it was.

Pictures soon. We're not traveling w a laptop so are depending on the I Pad and haven't figured out how to attach pics
But we will persevere.
Gotta go. Lots to see and do. Take care to you all
Kim and Gordon

Keepin it light !

Gordon and I have taken the challenge of keeping our packs really light very seriously.
Our goal was to keep them to about 20-25# each since we will be carrying them across the mountainous spine of Crete as well as along her rocky shoreline on the Greek E4 trail system.