Back to Italy

Alright folks, no pictures I'm afraid, but an update nonetheless (is that really just one word?). In Crete, I ended up in Hania, which is a beautiful little city right on the water. From there, I took a day to hike the gorgeous Samara Gorge, in all its splendor. At one point, the trail narrows to a mere 3 meters, while the cliff faces on either side of you rise to over 300 meters! Pretty cool. And the bus trip there and back were also pretty intense. Trust me, you don't kow the meaning of the word "switchback" until you've been to Crete. You spend half your driving time just going back and forth, trying to climb over the mountains they have there. You're also in a coach bus, driving on one-lane roads clearly not built for buses, with really sketchy dropoffs beside you... In short, lots of fun :)

From Hania, I caught a night ferry (gods, I hate those) to Athens, and then bussed to Naflpio, another beautiful little seaside town with a really cool, really massive castle perched on the cliffs overlooking the town. I also spent the afternoon exploring some old Mycean ruins, including the spectacular Agememnon's Tomb (basically a giant stone igloo built into a hill).

From there, I went to Olympia to check out... Olympia. Pretty neat ruins and a really good museum, plus I got the best meal I've had yet in Greece: A Gyros portion (with fries), a full loaf of freshly baked bread, a (big) greek salad and a 500 mL beer, for the low price of 8 euro. Not bad, I guess prices really come down come October (there's really no tourists around at all this time of year, relatively speaking).

And now I'm back in Patra, hanging out for a few hours until my ferry leaves. Hopefully I'll be able to get some photos up once I get to Naples, but don't hold your breaths. Talk to you all later.