Monday, April 2, 2012

Pylos, March 26-28: "I want ze yaiyai"

   Monday we spent the day packing and road-tripping it to Pylos.-which is on the other side of the Mainland from Napflion. Before we made it to Pylos, we stopped at the Methone Venetian Fortress which is where Jacquelyn has decided she wants to live (no big deal, of course). I swear the sites just keep getting more and more breathtaking. I probably could have just sat at this place for days if I were able. This fortress sits on the edge of the land and you can actually touch the Ionian Sea (which Kylie did immediately). This may have been the hardest place to choose one picture to post because I love all my pictures from here. We spent a couple hours here just wandering (again, like kids at recess), and then eventually made our way to Pylos. Although the pension in Napflion was exciting, it was pretty great to be in a hotel again, with our own bathrooms and showers. That pension definitely made me appreciate a lot of different amenities that I take advantage of in the States. We all ate together at a little seaside restaurant, tried a bunch of new Greek dishes, and eventually made our way to bed.
Venetian Fortress at Methone
   We woke up, again early Tuesday morning, and headed to the palace of Nestor, another Mycenean site. This palace was similar to Lerna's setup but had details more like Mycenae did. This site is known for its large hearth in the center of one of the rooms and basically how well it was preserved. I found it really interesting (see people, I am actually learning over here). We returned to the hotel, ate lunch, and had a review session for our first exam (to be taken on Friday). Afterwards, a few of us headed out, did some fruit shopping (very common for us because the fruit over here is AMAZING), and found this cute little place called "George's Cafe". Unfortunately, people in Greece don't eat dinner at 5 or 6 like we do in the States, therefore we are constantly trying to suppress our hunger until later around 8 or 9pm to attempt to fit in with the culture. So we went back to the hotel, told the rest of the group about this place, and returned with a few more people later that evening. By far the best decision we have made on this trip! 6 of us walked in and were asked to go into the kitchen where this little old lady, or a "yiayia" was standing beside all of this food she had made. So we picked out about 10 different dishes to split, sat back down, ordered some wine, and feasted on THE best dinner I have ever tasted in my life. I am embarrassed to say we finished that dinner in a record time of 8 minutes (all 10 dishes), but if you could have only tasted what we did, you would understand. The best part is that it was so cheap for SO much food! The 6 of us made sure that we boasted to the rest of the group about how amazing this dinner was and how they had missed out. Jacquelyn's one comment that night summed up the trip to Pylos easily; she doesn't want the recipes from the feast: "she wants ze yiayia".
Hearth and Megaron at the Palace of Nestor in Pylos
   Wednesday was our last day in Pylos and was spent most of the day traveling. However, we did stop in Kalambata at another museum (yay...)...once we were back in Athens we returned to our humble home at Dioskouros, grabbed dinner, and went to bed.


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