Day 12 Thu Jun 17

Day Twelve Thursday June 17th

A pretty hectic day. The cruise ship had arrived at Crete and we had to be ready to go on our Knossos Palace tour at 7:30. The tour was interesting but it was VERY hot out. The ruins of the Palace were noticeably older than the other ruins that we had seen. This is the place where the legend of the minotaur arose.

Interesting Bible tidbit: Crete was known in the ancient world for three primary things: 
1. the legend of the god Zeus changing form into a bull in order to seduce Europa
2. the minotaur
3. King Midas (of the Golden Touch)
So when Paul writes in Titus 1:12-13 about the Cretans being "liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons" he is referencing these three myths, he is not making things up.

We did not have a long time at Knossos Palace, as we had to get back to the boat, which then sailed for Santorini. Santorini is a volcano that erupted many years ago, probably creating the legend of Atlantis; the explosion is estimated at 10 times the size of Krakatoa. The explosion left about a third of a circle as the only land above the Mediterranean. We arrived there, and had to take tender boats (or lighters) to shore. Some people were on a tour, others were on their own. The volcano caldera is one of the largest calderas in the world, and there is a goodly amount of land, which is very picturesque, with some very amazing scenery. The towns on Santorini are up on the cliff of the remaining land, and there were only a few ways up to them: be on the bus tour up, take the cable car up, ride donkeys up, or walk up.

On the bus tour, by the time we got to our destination in Oia Village, we had only about 30 minutes of free time to explore and take pictures, and then we had leave for Thira. By the time we reached Thira, we only had time to take a couple of pictures and then take the cable car down to the shore to take the tender boats back to the boat. Even with the short amount of time, the ship was still over an hour late departing Santorini. Basically, it was just crazy to try to do both Crete and Santorini in the same day.

After we got back to the boat, we had a short time with Pastor Wayne talking about Titus and how he had been a "guinea pig for grace" (Gal 2:1-9).

After that we had to pack and our large bags out of the room by midnight, with an early call to leave the ship in the morning.

*Dale*