Rhodes

I am discovering the joys of May and June in Germany. So far I have had 2 long weekends and have 2 more coming up. Last Thursday was a holiday, and we got the Friday off school - so a 4 day long weekend!! With some friends from school I went to Rhodes, Greece for 3 nights. 

The trip started off kind of crazy. We had a 5:20 am flight, so had to be up just after 3 in order to catch a cab to the airport. It was weird getting up so early, but I was so excited that I had no problems. We arrived in Greece about 9:30 am. We stayed right in the Old Town, so the taxi could only take us to one of the gates. (Though that didn't stop scooters, and even some cars, from driving through the Old Town). 

Here is the gate we came in through: And yes, we did have to watch out for cars here. 

The Old Town in Rhodes is not from ancient Greek times, as I had first wondered, but from medieval times. This area of the town is the old walled city. Now of course there is much of the city of Rhodes outside the old town walls. 

What we saw a lot of - boarded up buildings and also unfinished buildings

View of the harbour. The two columns that now have statues of stags on top were once where the feet of the Colossus of Rhodes stood.

Wall of the harbour. We spent quite a bit of the first afternoon up here, relaxing in the sun.

A common site in Rhodes - a stray cat! Really made me miss my cats back home.

Day 2: Road trip to Lindos with a stop at the beach. We hired a car and drove up the island to see some of the other sites, and go for a swim!

Cara and I in the Mediterranean :)

Enjoying the waves, right before heading for cover...

...as dark clouds and rain rolled in

Nice weather again once we made it to Lindos. Not very big, but with an acropolis at the top of the hill.

View of the acropolis. It looks like there are lots of ruins still standing, but in fact much of those have been put back together and recreated. Its kind of an odd combination, they've created a ruin. 

The other view of the acropolis and the Mediterranean below

Jennifer, Cara and I!

Me :)

The cobblestones in Rhodes. They are small rocks on their ends making very pretty designs. It was a cool way to do cobblestones, but here you did not get any grip on the ground. We all had to be careful not to slip going down the hill.

Lindos: The square where we had our lunch

Day 3: Back in Rhodes. The next morning we all headed our own ways. I headed straight to the archaeology museum. It was housed in the old Knights Hospital. The Knights Hospitallers were the medieval leaders of the city. Inside were ancient artifacts from all over the island. 

View into the courtyard of the museum

My favourite part was the huge garden in the back. It had more artifacts in it, but was also just a gorgeous place to be on a sunny, warm day

The main street of the Old Town

We had meals in the various restaurants along the main street. At meal times each restaurant would have someone out front trying to entice customers into their place. So as you walked by they would start talking to you, trying to get you in for food or drinks. Because we were speaking English, we often were asked where we were from. A bit complicated - Germany, Canada, USA? 

The clock tower

Another kitty - this time in a box :)

The remains of the race track

Cara and I trekked out to the Acropolis of Rhodes our last afternoon. A bit hard to find because we had to get half way there before we found any signs. We had actually just decided to check out the ancient race track when we discovered it was also the site of the acropolis. We overheard a tour there, and apparently there are many more levels of seats hidden under the trees and bushes. 

All that is left

And this is the acropolis in its entirety. If you look closely you can even tell that this has been recreated too. So I guess all that was really left was a small piles of stones. Makes me wonder if they actually formed three complete columns, or were just put together that way to actually have something complete.