The church did not impress me, but I was able to say I saw a Byzatine structure in Greece. After all, Greece was part of the Byzatine empire for 1000 years and the least I could do if I am in Greece is to see Byzantine stuff.

Ferry to Crete
 
 
Prelude
Arrival
Glyfada
Sunion
Aegina
Corinth
Mycenae
Epidarros & Naphlion
Olympia
To Delphi
Exploring Delphi
To Crete
Hania
Samarian Gorge
Knossos
Iraklion
Athens Day 1
Athens Day 2
The End
Greece Photos!
  

A Ferry to Crete - Κρητη


Here was the plan for today: Drive Big Red back to the Athens' airport, and bid him a fond farewell. Take some sort of train to Piraeus, and hang out there until our ferry left. Take the ferry to Crete, and have an awesome time on Crete.

 
A famous monastery in Greece
Our ferry didn't leave until like 7pm at night (it was an overnight ferry), so we did have some time to kill. I read about a pretty cool Byzantine monastery that was sort of on the way. The guidebook said that it was formal dress, with no shorts allowed, and woman must cover their shoulders, so we threw on some decent clothes, got totally lost on the way there, backtracked (including a U-turn on a blind cut-back in the mountains, which was fun), and arrived there. The place itself was kind of boring, but the highlight for me was a bunch of American students of the female persuasion who showed up, definitely not completely covered. Lin-Wei was mad at them, and I was too (as far as she knows).

 
The best thing in Piraeus was these lockers
We did make it back to the airport just fine, and onto the train to Piraeus. We found some lockers to store our bags, and we tried to find a way to kill 2 hours in this wonderful port city. This wait made me hate the town even more. There were no decent restaurants around, so we ended up having to eat really crappy sandwiches on a bench outside the train terminal, while sitting next to a creepy old guy and fighting off the pigeons. The only Internet cafe we were able to located was closed, which blew my mind. Here, in the span of two blocks, was the busiest bus stop, train station, metro station, and port in Greece, and there were no Internet cafes. If any of you are looking for a business opportunity, this is it. You'll make a killing. But you'd have to go to Piraeus everyday.

I almost got killed by a motorcyclist who ran a red light. The smog from all the cars and buses was choking, and there was absolutely nothing to do there. So we went back to our bench by the train station and killed even more time.

Finally, around 5:30 we collected out bags and went to the boat, hoping they would let us on early. And they did!

We didn't really know what to expect on this overnight ferry. When we got the tickets we could either get "deck" tickets, or pay extra to get a cabin. We had opted for the cabin. This turned out to be completely worth it. Entering the boat, a fully operational escalator brings you up to the main level. Proceeding to the check in desk, we got our keys, and the next bell-boy in a line of about 30 brought us to our rooms. He must have figured that he wasn't going to get a tip from the likes of us, because he made no effort to help us with our bags. I considered making him right, but I relented at the last moment.

 
I was drunk around this time
Our "ferry" seemed more like a cruise boat. It was totally pimped out. There were two restaurants, a bar, a night club, a casino, and a roof pool with cabana bar. After exploring for a bit, we hit the bar and I had two glasses of wine. We set sail while we were drinking, so after the wine was finished we headed outside so I could get some pictures. I don't know what it was, but somehow on the way down the stairs outside I completely lost my footing, began to slide down the stairs on my behind, and ended up kicking Lin-Wei in hers before I came to a stop. I'm sure it wasn't the all the wine I had just drunk.... I'm sure <hic>.

We turned in soon after, and though I woke up a couple of times feeling a tad nauseous, we made it to Crete with no problem. Our room had bunk beds, a shower, and all the fixings of a really small hotel room. It also had the small trash can... Luckily I had found a public bathroom on one of the lower decks, so it wasn't an issue. I vowed that night to try and continue this policy of third-party bathrooms. It worked out real nice.