Sunday, September 23, 2012

Greece - Rhodes

Day 233 - Tuesday, Sept. 11

As mentioned in the last post, I took a midnight ferry from Santorini to Rhodes, a Greek Island close to the southwest coast of Turkey. It was about a 14-hour ferry ride, arriving in Rhodes around 4pm and I didn't have a cabin. So I did my best impersonation of a homeless person and slept on a public couch/bench in the cafe area before it became overrun with loud obnoxious kids. Actually, I probably shouldn't say "impersonation" seeing as how I am technically homeless. A pic of my not-exactly-luxurious ferry boat after we arrived:
From Greece - Rhodes
Rhodes was quite different from the other Greek islands - probably a result of its proximity to Turkey. For example, there was not blue and white houses everywhere. I was only in Rhodes for about 24 hours, so I didn't get a chance to see anything other than the old town area around the port. In retrospect, I kind of wish I had spent a little longer there and checked out more of the island, but the old town area was pretty neat - very medieval feel.

Tuesday night, I didn't do much, but did wander around a bit and caught another nice sunset:
From Greece - Rhodes
From Greece - Rhodes
From Greece - Rhodes


Day 234 - Wednesday, Sept. 12

By the time I finally got my lazy ass out of bed, I only had a few hours to check out more of the city before my ferry to Turkey, but it's a small city, so I saw a lot of it. It's centered around an old castle, which is open to exploration, including the underground tunnels.
Castle:
From Greece - Rhodes
One such tunnel:
From Greece - Rhodes
Against my better judgment, I decided to venture down into the tunnels and see where they led, with only the occasional flash from the camera to light the way.
From Greece - Rhodes
Um, it's kind of dark in here:
From Greece - Rhodes
I think I've seen too many scary movies, because I was actually pretty on edge. Between being scared of the dark and contemplating reading the Fifty Shades trilogy, I should probably worry about my man-card being revoked.

Rhodes' greatest claim to fame is probably that it was home to the Colossus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, which was a giant statue of a dude whose legs stood on either side of the entrance to the harbor. But all that's left now is some small statues with little deer on them:
From Greece - Rhodes
A few other photos as I roamed around the city for the afternoon:
From Greece - Rhodes
From Greece - Rhodes
From Greece - Rhodes

The place I bought my ferry ticket from told me the ferry left at 5:00. So I was a little surprised when I strolled up at 4:40 and the office where I was supposed to exchange my voucher for a ticket was closed and they were pulling up the gangplank to the boat. A mad rush to get a ticket and run through customs ensued, but I managed to make it on board. Apparently the boat leaves at 4:30 - thanks a lot travel-agent-lady.

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