Knossos – well-restored rooms. Spacious. Light-filled. Vast storage jars called: pithoi. Tick. Three 20-something backpackers read sign outside rooms. Sign says: MAGAZIN. Girl says: “I didn’t know they had magazines in those days.” One guys says: “I think it refers to the magazine of a gun…” Other guy silent. Looks confused. First two dawdle to next set of rooms. Other guy stays. Looks at sign. Looks at room. Looks baffled. (I want to write that he scratched his head but that would be a lie. But I do imagine him scratching his head.) magasin = shop/store in French? Pithoi in rooms – a store room? French archaeologists? Is ‘magazin’ warehouse in Greek? Look this up. Guards start blowing whistles continuously! They shout loudly and rudely at us!! “Ruins are closing. Leave immediately!” Like being in concentration camp/prison! I look at watch – 15 minutes to go!!! They obviously have somewhere to go. Things to do: write letter of complaint to Ministry for Tourism. English backpacking couple look incredulously at guidebook. Poor things just arrived! Guy approaches guard. “Guidebook is wrong!” shouts guard, “They are always wrong!” (Well, mine is right.) “Come back tomorrow,” she barks. “But tomorrow we’ll be at Gortys” (Another ruin on other side of island. Dates to Minoan times. Guards nice there, although still looked like they’d prefer to be at home) “Does Gortys close at the same time?” “Of course!” growls guard, “These are the winter hours!” She whistles in his face. (This is true.) Couple look disappointed in guidebook. Ticket guy must have been asleep when they came through – forgot to tell them they had no time to see anything. Couple run around and take photos. Guard keeps whistling. Terry still taking photos for book. Sees me. Looks at watch. Looks at guard. Shakes head. (Still 10 minutes before official closing time. Takes 1 minute to walk to exit.) Guard looks at us “The ruins are closing!” she barks for hundredth time. Terry says to me: “Don’t worry, I haven’t sworn at her yet.” Guard understands. Looks Terry up and down. Says something in Greek to other guard. Clearly not commenting on his clothes. We admire cherry blossoms on way out. Bookshop. Tick. Souvenir shop. Tick. Café. Tick. Ancient Knossos. Tick.
Visit to Knossos, most popular archaeological site in Crete: ancient Minoan palace (AKA Minos) settlement built around 2000BC. Neolithic remains suggest area settled as far back as 6000BC! Accommodated 100,000 people at height of Minoan civilization!! After paying for tickets, ticket guy tells me ruins close in 1 hour. Closing time. Tick. “Be quick,” he says, closes eyes, returns to sleep. “I’m a writer, updating a guidebook,” I tell him. “I need to check the phone number and summer opening hours.” (It’s winter. I already know price.) Ticket guy looks bored. Disinterested. Woman hovering behind me, shoves me aside aggressively, sticking her head near window. She must know closing time, I think. Eager to see ruins. Still, she’s rude.“Do you mind?” I ask her, irritated. “I’m helping you with translation,” she says. The ticket seller speaks English. “Do you need a guide?” she asks. “No, we’ve been here before,” I lie. (It’s easier this way.) She goes away. (If I simply said 'no' she would keep following us, firing trivial titbits and random dates at us. That’s what they do, hoping we’ll say: “Oh, come on then, we’ve changed our minds, you’ve impressed us so much with your incredible knowledge of useless facts and dull trivia, we'd love you to chatter away at us endlessly for hours, spoiling our pleasure of the ruins!”) Knossos – controversial - in 1900 English archaeologist Arthur Evans hastily reconstructed much of palace – Evans said original wooden pillars and beams would have collapsed otherwise. Result splendid – vividly painted walls, red pillars, vibrant mosaics and frescoes. Flamboyant. Did it really look like this?? Two Japanese travellers race around – one eye on guidebooks, other on sights. (Is that possible?) They look at watches more than ruins. Two female Greek guards check out Japanese girls. Look them up and down. Speak to each other in Greek. Commenting on clothes? Greek guards could take inspiration from murals – Minoans really knew how to dress! Elderly French couple spend inordinate amount of time admiring enormous pottery urns. Surely they know they only have an hour?! It’s a massive site! (Okay, this happened at Phaistos, but it seems appropriate to place it here.) Phaistos Palace dates to 1900 BC. Beautifully sprawled down a hillside overlooking a fertile valley. I spend more time watching old French couple than I do enjoying ruins. What if couple wander to far end of site, guard (eager to get home) doesn’t see them and locks them in?! Staff start to leave 15 minutes before closing time – they appear irritated that we take our time. Don’t they know how far we have all come to see these ruins?!
Are you a journal writer? Do you keep a journal when you travel or does your blog suffice? When I was younger, before I became a professional travel writer, I used to keep journals whenever I travelled. I'd write most days, usually with a drink in hand, from my hotel balcony, an al fresco café or the window table of an atmospheric bar somewhere. Like this one at El Hipopotamo in San Telmo, Buenos Aires. I'd document my journeys and reflect upon my experiences and the people I had met. And I'd muse about the nature of travel more generally. I'd paste in labels, tickets, postcards, and other paraphernalia. Don't we all? But now, I find it impossible. I make random notes for a book my partner and I are planning to write about our experience on the road as we travel the globe, living out of our suitcases for 21 months. But mostly I'm too busy keeping the practical notebooks on cities and countries that are the basis of our research for the guidebooks and stories we write. They're crammed with business cards, notes from hotel inspections, reviews of restaurants, cafés, bars, clubs, sights, museums, galleries and so on, along with scrawled bus times, internet café details, driving directions, opening hours and prices, occasional jottings from interviews, and descriptions of landscapes and citiescapes and the people who inhabit them. I'd like to be able to return to the days of leisurely journal writing. In the meantime I'll admire other people's imaginative efforts, such as those of the 1000 Journals which are currently travelling the globe; the delightful treatsandtreasures.com, a blog by a journal keeper (thank you, Prêt à Voyager); and the exquisite journals of Dan Eldon, a travel enthusiast and photojournalist who died a tragic death in Somalia at 22. His beautiful but short life is documented on a website and in a book 'The Journey is the Destination' by his mother and sister. Do let me know if there are any other great travel journal blogs or books out there.
