And six months later...

Maria Beach on Crete at it's best! Azure Blue...

I am on Crete. Yeah that's right - Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis Crete! The island bearing the ruins of the famous Palace of Knossos, which by the way I haven't seen yet. There's nothing I could do, since I am here with my research group and on the completely other side of the island (We're on the western shore, Knossos is all the way to the east).

A little view of the 'City' Promenade in Kissamos, palm tree included...

So far we experienced rather nice weather, with around 28°C and crystal blue sky and topaz colored water. Today (Sunday the 27th of September) however someone went out at night and painted both sky and sea in gray. It has been raining constantly since morning, though not too heavily. Still we did a nice little tour to the south side of the island to see if the weather is any better there. It wasn't!!! :(

Crete under heavy clouds on Sunday the 27th of September...

More clouds and fog on a view from our trip through the mountians to reach Phalanasi Beach.

I've attached a few pictures so that you have an impression of how great it usually was the rest of the week. Don't think however that all we did was fool around and order cocktails in the sun. We did some honest work each day, trying to decide about the future of our research and stuff like that. I introduced my nearly finished thesis (about 230 pages) and after much debate, still have to change a few parts of the argumentation and come up with at least one new scenario. So as always, it's still not finally done. :( Everyone agreed though, that I am on a good way and once I figured the discussed things into the 'equation', I could basically hand the PhD thesis in. Whewhew! Well I am guessing I'll need a little more than a month for that, but PLEASE GOD and whoever else can help me let me finish before Christmas!!! I'll need to find a new job and I need time for that!

A car junk jard apparently placed right in front of a company called "Europa" ;) Mind you, this doesn't mean we Europeans are bad drivers, just that trash is part of our lives just as much as yours...

Oh and finally, a little news on Petpet and Kuki. My two frogs were with me on Crete and loved sitting on the beach, as you can see below. But only Petpet decided to take a 'dip' in the water :D

Petpet and Kuki dozing in the nice Cretian sun, safely out of range of the sea...

Petpet is a little hero in my eyes now, because he actually risked everything, just so that I could get a photo of him on some rocks being washed over by the 'raging' sea. He received a whole stick of chewing gum for that perfect feat :) I can only say he was very happy and would do it again without any hesitation. Only drying him up again, took at least 6 hours of sitting on yellow serviettes.

...or not! At least only Petpet got hit by the water and he just laughed and dried up quickly.

Thanks for the patience my friends

Staroc