Chora

This morning theHammer woke us up bright and early to get on the first bus into Chora. I was not in agreement with waking the kids (or myself) up so early so I channeled all that annoyance into a nice long run. 7.5k in 40 minutes. That’s good for me. But we missed the bus lol.

We took a taxi into Chora (which costs 5 Euro instead of the 2.80 Euro the bus costs) right to the Cash and Carry market. We filled up the backpack with groceries and then walked into town, stopping at the playground, the cemetary, Agios Georgios beach (a nice long shallow area in the sea), a walk along the huge marble slabs, and then into the old city area. By then the kids were complaining and we told them to look at it as an adventure because they have no idea what might be around the next corner. And what do you know… around the next corner was the Middletons which gave our kids the big boost they needed to start having fun again lol.

We all went into the Archeological Museum in the Venetian Castle that is in the center of the old city. Apparently a guy from Venice came and captured 18 islands in the area and chose Naxos to be the capital and built this castle in 1207. There was a lot of pottery, some statues, and some glass ware. One reason we came here was to educate our children in the historical and artistic dimensions of this part of the world. S seemed to really grasp onto those concepts today, particularly when he was running around ensuring that all the sculptures indeed had naked backsides on their backsides. My favourite ‘thing’ was the stone mosaic on the rooftop, approx. 20 ft square or so. It was really beautiful.

Next, we came back down the hill to get some fruit salad and ice cream for the kids and coffees for mom and dad at siesta time. Then we did some more browsing before jumping on the bus home. 

The kids ate quite heartily and promptly fell asleep . They were definitely tuckered out after the long day running around.

Now for some pictures…

The kids got to play on their very first merry-go-round. They have sung songs about merry-go-rounds for years, but had no idea what it was called lol.

 

A nice optical illusion for you to mull over… Look at the pic straight on, then tilt your head 45 degrees to the left for the real view.

 

I don’t know who was more excited…S or Mommy as he went across the monkey bars for the first time ever! He said he could do it because the bars were closer together than at home. He is actually not quite tall enough to reach the bars at the school playground on his own, so this was so great for him!

 

While on our walk, we heard the ferry honk as it came in to the harbour and then about half an hour later, we heard it honk as it was leaving. Then it kept honking again and again and again so we hurried to see what was going on, and this crazy sailboat was trying to beat the ferry! I don’t think it even realized that the ferry was going to turn right right away either and keep on being honked at lol.

 

Sitting on the marble slabs with Chora’s old city in the background. 

 

Some of the marble. This picture really doesn’t do it justice. The pieces were huge and the kids both loved walking along them.

 

In the port.

 

In the old city.

 

I love how the doors and windows look like they are just sitting in the middle of nowhere.

 

Some more goofy perspective.

 

A family pic. The camera was a bit tilted, not us.

 

 

 

A happy flower…

 

No railing up the stairs, but a gate at the end that mentions something about danger.

 

A sneaky-peak inside an old door.

 

Here is a pic for all you retired electricians out there… Can you charge double for installing wiring that is used for electricity as well as a clothes line??

 

I believe my J’s exact words were… “I can speak Chinese” as they browsed the English magazine together.

 

The giant pineapples we saw by the side of the road.

 

Even a smelly fishing boat looks romantic here!!

 

Tomorrow we are hanging around here… Every day more and more restaurants are closing down for the winter season. Hopefully the weather will be nice for swimming in the sea again – today was quite windy and was the perfect day to go into town. Until tomorrow…