Dudley & Sarah's first jottings from Mochlos....

This is our blog for our summer in Crete, where we are spending time in Mochlos, or paradise as we sometimes call it!

Well, I’ve only just managed to work out how to set up a blog and we are already on our 12^th day in Crete, so I’ll try to summarise that first week and a half, together with a few pictures.

It already seems quite a long time ago that we were picked up at 0440 from our house on a misty, damp morning in England and then just less than 7 hours later were collecting our hire car from Yiorgos and Nikos at Iraklion airport and setting off for Mochlos.  We had one ‘incident’ en route when passing a large tree branch, where the wing mirror on the passenger side flew off!  Oh well, at least no-one was hurt.

View down to Mochlos

Alexandros

Here on the left is one of our favourite views of the village, after descending down past the modern quarry, Mochlos Mare (the apartments where we first stayed) comes into view.

For our summer in Mochlos though, we are staying at Alexandros villa,only a short walk away from Mochlos Mare.

Having unpacked and checked out the apartment we wandered down to Mochlos Mare to meet Maria & Joan who had decided to stay on for a further week after the Sussex CCE trip to Crete so that they could see even more Minoan sites.  We also saw Panagiotis, Sterie, Yiorgis and Demeter, who all seemed pleased to see us (as were we them).  

For our first supper in Mochlos we went to Kokylia Taverna and reminded Yiorgis that we would be here until September!


Myrtos Pyrgos - Courtyard

For our first trip out we collected Maria & Joan on Thursday morning and set off for Ierapetra museum, where the lady in charge was very friendly and tried to help us with our Greek (it’s such a difficult language!).  After spending some time in the museum we drove on to Myrtos Pyrgos, where after a short climb we reached the Minoan settlement on the top of a hill with a stunning view – although as usual Greek ‘health & safety’ meant that there was no fencing, just a sheer drop (but then anyone should be able to work out you are at the top of a hill).

Pseira Island

On the way back from Myrtos, we stopped at a Nissan garage where they managed to find a (secondhand) replacement wing mirror for us (hurrah!).  We then had lunch at the Pixidia taverna in Platanos with stunning views across to Pseira island.

House I 1 at Petras

Hieroglyph Archive at Petras

Not put off by their first day out with us, Maria & Joan joined us again the following day (Friday) where we went first to Sitia museum and thanks to a very nice lady there managed to borrow the key to the site at Petras (kept locked and not currently open to the public, although it has been laid out very nicely with informative visitor boards).  Spent a good while wandering round Petras, trying to remember how it had looked when we first visited a few years ago.  We both remembered clearly the numerous storage areas as well as the ‘palace’ area, and of course the great view that so many sites have.

After lunch at a beach taverna in Palaikastro we then went round the site itself, where much has been covered over since the original excavations, and is generally a bit of a jumble, but still worth wandering around.

Saturday marked a ‘day off’ sites for us all and notably was also Maria’s birthday so we had a celebratory supper in Kokylia that evening.

Morgos (or is it Bobby)

Sunday, 24^th June – our 4^th day in Crete, marked our first run on the island!  We took our ‘usual’ route down past the ‘French quarter’ to turn round at a taverna and return – stopping at Mochlos Mare, mostly because we were worn out, but also to say hello to Panagiotis, who ‘rewarded’ us with apricots and cucumbers.  The dogs were also pleased to see us, although I still can’t work out which is Morgos and which is Bobby !

On the way to the waterfall at Richtis

Ready for the day ahead after our early morning exercise, we set off with Maria & Joan to visit the site of Chamaizi (more Minoan ruins!) then on to Richtis where we took a very windy road down to the beach and a walk through the woods to the waterfall (our guide book said the walk would take 30 minutes, but it took us considerably longer, although it was made all the more pleasant by Joan explaining the sites of nature that greeted us along the way).  The waterfall itself was extremely busy with many locals out for a picnic and a swim!

Waterfall at Richtis

Monday saw us take a boat across to Mochlos island (with the ‘new’ boatman Yiannis) where we then spent about an hour and a half walking round the site, up to the Hellenistic fort on the top and round to the Minoan graves.  The American archaeologists were working on site, and some were more friendly towards us that others!  Rang the bell to summon Yiannis to take us back to the mainland and then met up with Nick.  Stuart and Iwona arrived late afternoon and came round for drinks before we set off to meet Maria & Joan for their last supper in Mochlos.

View back to Mochos from the island

Having had a lazy day on Tuesday, we managed our second run on Wednesday (27^th June), again ending at Mochlos Mare where Panagiotis had a freshly picked melon ready for us!  Our aim is to run on Monday, Wednesday and Friday (with Saturday and Sunday ‘available’ as reserve days should we not make it during the week!).

'Ancient Olive Tree' at Kavousi

Now we have ‘fresh’ set of willing victims for showing round the sites (Stuart & Iwona), we set off on Thursday to visit Gournia, where another set of Americans are working!  We also went down to look at the Minoan harbour and then back to Pixidia restaurant (with the view) for seafood salad.  Meeting up for drinks in Mochlos Mare garden proved a little ‘dangerous’ as we ended up having one (or several) glasses of raki with Panagiotis before we ‘escaped’ for supper at Bogazi and live music (Greek of course!)

Vronda - looking around

Friday morning (unable to run after the raki of the previous night!), Stuart wanted to make use of the jeep they had hired, so we went off to Kavousi and drove into the mountains to see the ‘ancient olive tree’ and the archaeological site of Vronda.   The route was pretty bumpy, but the jeep did well!  We then went on to the Minoan site at Vasiliki (open but the ‘gate’ is under the fence) before another lunch at Pixidia.

Vronda - still looking !

Vronda - the jeep and the view

Saturday we had to use our ‘reserve’ running day, but we made it and were greeted at Mochlos Mare, this time only by Morgos and Bobby.  We went off to Plaka with Stuart and Iwona, and spent a very lazy and pleasant late morning and afternoon having coffee, browsing the shops and having lunch at Thalassa, a very nice taverna on the seafront.  Whilst there we looked across the Spinalonga island and saw lots of black flags on top – apparently an ‘art exhibition’ the cost of which is a bit of a controversy at the moment, our waiter said 300, 000 euros had been paid by the government, but a lady in a shop wasn’t so sure !

Black flags flying on Spingalonga

Today, 2nd July, Stuart took us out in the jeep where we went looking for the Kastro site behind Kavousi village.  We didn't find it, but we did cross the Thrypti mountain range and end up on the south of the island!  Oh well, another site we will have to find another day.