Italy | Venice | St. Mark’s Basilica | Four Horses

Of all the treasures looted by Doge Enrico Dandolo and the Venetians during the sack of Constantinople in 1204 perhaps the most famous are the four horses now on display in St. Mark’s Basilica Museum in Venice. Where these horses were originally made and by whom is a matter of great scholarly debate. I intend to investigate this matter in due course. For the moment suffice it to say that they eventually ended up on top of one of the gates of the immense stadium in Constantinople known as the Hippodrome. After being seized by the Venetians in 1204 they stood for centuries on the facade of St. Mark’s Basilica. When Napoleon Bonaparte seized Venice in 1797 he had them carted off the Paris, a fittingly prize for what he considered to be the new center of world civilization. After the Little General met his Waterloo they were returned to Venice and placed back on the facade of St. Mark’s. Air pollution from industries on the mainland, however, wrecked havoc on the copper statues. In the 1970s copies were made and placed on the facade. The originals are now in the museum on the second floor of the basilica, just behind the facade. 

Artist’s rendering of the Hippodrome in Constantinople. It seated about 100,000 people. The four horses were probably atop the center gate at the upper right of the photo. The Hippodrome is gone but many of the monuments in the center can still be seen today (click on photos for enlargements).

Artist’s rendering of the gate, center, with the horses atop

The area where the Hippodrome stood is now occupied by Sultanahmet Square. The photo was taken roughly where the gate stood that supported the horses. The obelisk in the middle of the photo can be seen in the artist’s rendering above.

St. Mark’s Basilica

Facade of St. Mark’s Basilica

Horses on the loggia of St. Mark’s Basilica

Another view of the horses on the loggia of St. Mark’s Basilica

The horses of St. Mark’s Basilica

The horses of St. Mark’s Basilica

The horses of St. Mark’s Basilica

The horses of St. Mark’s Basilica

The original horses now the Basilica museum. Not my photo. If you take photos in the museum you are thrown into the cell that legendary lover Casanova once occupied in the dungeon of the nearby Ducal Palace.

Horse’s view of St. Mark’s Square

Horse’s view of St. Mark’s Square

Horse’s view of the Ducal Palace. Casanova was once locked up here. He was under arrest for being a world-class cad and an insufferable douchebag.

St. Mark atop his basilica

St. Mark: “Oh Lord, what have I wrought?”

St. Mark’s at twilight

Cyprus | Paphos | Moon | Aphrodite

Carnival begins in Venice on Jan. 27 but people start celebrating early. When I saw the first people in masks in Campo St. Bartholomew I hurried back to my hotel room and booked the next flight to Athens via Istanbul. Took the 7:32 am water bus to the airport the next morning. The Visa Flap with Turkey is over. All they did was raise the prices. Before an electronic visa was $20; now they are $70. I had a five hour layover in Istanbul so I took the Metro downtown to change money. The exchange rates in Venice are nothing short of larcenous. On Divan Yolu in Istanbul there are at least a dozen currency exchanges all competing against one another. Asking at half a dozen places the best offer I got for $1000 was 810 Euros. This was very close to the official exchange rate on the internet. The best offer I had in Venice was 750 Euros for $1000. And in Venice you have to present your passport and fill out a form which even asks for your address in the States. Like I have an address in the States! On Divan Yolu, of course, no one asks to see anything but your money.

I was going to stroll around the Sultanahmet area for awhile, but it was raining and a chill wind was blowing off the Sea of Marmara. I was wearing only a Mongolian cashmere sweater and no hat. So I took the Metro back to the airport and spent the rest of the layover in the Turkish Airlines Business Lounge, which as business lounges go is quite luxurious. Unlimited baklava! Actually I am flying economy, since on Turkish Airlines you can buy an exit row seat and the extra space was all I needed. But I am a Turkish Airlines Miles and Smiles Elite Gold Card holder so I get to use the Business Lounge even when flying economy. This is just one of the perks. Also priority check-in, priority boarding, and in Istanbul a special express lane through immigration, which is really handy. I have flown over 200,000 miles on Turkish Airlines the last four years, which is how I got the Gold Card. Those round-trip Ulaanbaatar-Istanbul miles—the equivalent of half-way around the world—add up fast.

Arrived in Athens around 9:00 pm local time. My portmanteau came out first on the luggage carousel—another Gold Card perk!—and I caught the Metro downtown.  Back once again at my Favorite Hotel literally in the shadow of the Acropolis. This place is a bit of a mystery. I would proffer that it was the best location of any hotel in Athens. The back entrance to the Acropolis is only a couple hundred feet away. A few hundred feet in the opposite direction is a square lined with restaurants. Monastery Square, a big shopping hub, is only a ten minute walk away. But this hotel always seems to have rooms. Admittedly the place is a bit down at the heels and the rooms are tiny. Couples might find them a bit cramped, unless they intend to spend their entire stay in bed, but for misanthropes like myself there is no problem. And the bathroom is even tinier; it also serves as a shower. There is a shower drain in the floor. But the luggage platform and the dresser have gorgeous white marble tops that many people would die for. I like to think it is the same marble they used for the Parthenon.

Next morning I took the Metro back out to the airport and caught the flight to Cyprus. In Larnaka flowers are in bloom, there are oranges and lemons on the trees, and the famous pink flamingos are back in the lake by the side of the road from the airport. I stopped by my Armenian tailor to have new shirts made. He has my measurements on file but he took them again to see if there were any changes. It turns out my waistline is four inches less than three years ago. And I have been consciously eating more in an attempt to keep my weight up to fighting trim. To no avail, it appears. It is a constant struggle to keep body and soul together. 

The following morning I took the bus to Paphos, at the western end of Cyprus Island. Paphos is, of course, the birthplace of Aphrodite. While in Paphos I hope to celebrate the Super Blue Full Blood Moon happening on January 31. Fasten your seat belts, people, it’s going to be a wild ride!

My hotel in Paphos

Italy | Venice | We Crociferi

From Kastraki I took the train to Athens, where I once again stayed at my Favorite Hotel in the city. I could not resist climbing the Hill of the Muses again for another view of the Acropolis and the Parthenon.

The Acropolis, topped by the Parthenon (click on photos for enlargements)

The Parthenon. Unfortunately it always seems to be under repair.

The Acropolis at night, from the balcony of my hotel. The Parthenon is not visible from this angle.

Then took an early morning flight to Istanbul. Would have loved to stop for some mutton kebabs at the take-out place next to my Favorite Hotel in Istanbul, but of course I cannot enter Turkey because of the recent Visa Snafu. So I caught a connecting flight to Venice. The plane left Ataturk Airport in Istanbul at 5:36 p.m. It was dark at ground level when we took off, but we emerged from the low, heavy cloud cover just in time to see the sun sinking halfway below the horizon, now banded with fiery reddish-orange light that gradually faded into a dome of deep cobalt blue. For the next hour or so we chased the sun westward. Several times it reappeared above the horizon only to sink again. We finally lost the race with the sun and arrived at the predictably named Marco Polo Airport in total darkness at 5:50 local time, for a flight of two hours and fourteen minutes. There is no line at Immigration and my portmanteau is the second piece of luggage to emerge on the conveyor belt.

Marco Polo Airport has undergone major remodeling since I was here last. A fifteen minute walk on a new sky-bridge ends at the dock where water-buses now leave for the island of Murano and Venice itself.  From the water-bus it is impossible to make out anything in the dark and the fog. After about thirty minutes the lights of Murano Island water-bus stop appear out of the gloom. A half dozen people get off and we continue on another fifteen minutes to the  Fondamente Nuove stop on the north side of Venice itself. I am the only person getting off. Most passengers are continuing on to the hotels around St. Mark’s Square, on the south side of Venice, which offer more convenient access the city’s more famous sights. During the day numerous water buses to the airport, outlying islands, and other parts of Venice itself all converge here, and the walkway, lined with ticket vendors and attendant kiosks selling selling water, snacks, and souvenirs is usually bustling with transients. Now the Fondamente Nuove is eerily quiet. I look up and down the 800-yard long fog-shrouded walkway and do not see a single person; it appears as if the city is  deserted. 

I veer off Fondamente Nuove onto Salizzada dei Specchieri (street of the looking-glass makers), which is also suspiciously, forbiddingly empty. After a hundred yards or the eight massive  Corinthian columns that make the facade of the Church of the Gesuiti (Jesuits) rear up out of the gloom on my left. Above the entablature carried by the columns statues of the twelve apostles and assorted angels appear out of the fog. I get the discombobulating feeling that they are gazing down in judgment at the lone wanderer on the street below. Not that I am the first to be put off by these statues. W. D. Howells (1837–1920), erstwhile editor of the “Atlantic Monthly” and author of Venetian Life (1866), observed that “the sight of those theatrical angels, with their shameless, unfinished backs, flying off the top of the rococo façade of the church of the Jesuits, has always been a spectacle to fill me with despondency and foreboding.” A later observer, James Lees-Milne, in his Venetian Evenings, noted: “To my mind these statues look more like lost souls about to throw themselves in despair to the bottomless pit, only prevented from doing so by the rusted iron bands which tie their loose limbs together and keep them in.” By now a surprisingly chilly and uncomfortably damp wind is gusting through the street, adding to my discomfiture. The tee-shirt and Mongolian cashmere sweater I had donned that morning in Athens are clearly inadequate.

The Salizzada dei Specchieri opens out into the Campo dei Gesuiti, a long narrow square likewise empty. On the left side of the square, abutting the Church of the Gesuiti, stands an immense white-walled five story building that was once a Jesuit monastery. It has been transformed into both living quarters for students and a hotel for the public. Veering off the square and through a portal I emerge into a huge courtyard lined by a colonnaded passageway. In the courtyard and passageway are huddled groups of people, presumably students, the first humans I have seen since arriving at the Fondamente Nuove. Lady Gaga booms from the sound system of a cafe off to the side, accompanied by a buzz of conversation and laughter. I am back among the living. 

The receptionist assigns me to a room on the fifth floor. You have to use your key card to use the elevator. After passing through three unmarked doors and wandering down several long corridors I finally locate my room in an isolated cul-de-sac. I cannot help but wonder if I have been purposely exiled to this out of way corner of the huge building, away from the younger and more livelier residents. If so, this suites me fine. The last thing I need is some noisy college students next door. According its website the We Crociferi has shared dormitory-style rooms, private rooms with bath, studio rooms, and small apartments complete with kitchens. It is not clear how many of these units it hosts, but the entire facility has 255 beds, all of them singles. The website is quick to point out that these single beds cannot be joined together. Perhaps this is a residual holdover from its days as a Jesuit monastery, and now an attempt to maintain some degree of propriety among the college students who stay here. Some on-line reviews, apparently from adult couples, grouse about the lack of any double beds in the rooms. Why these people find such a problem with a single bed is beyond me. If they want to couple they can do so on a single bed. I have done it more times than I can count. Then they can retire to separate single beds. Or they can just remain in the single bed, which may result in even greater intimacy, since you simply cannot roll over to your own side of the bed after coupling is completed. In any case, my room has three single beds, only one of which I will be using. As far as I know I will not be doing any coupling in Venice.

Room decor is minimalist; gray concrete floors with no carpets or rugs, and whitewashed brick walls. In keeping with its function as student quarters a built-in formica topped desk extends the entire length of the front wall. Study lamps on flex-arms light the desk area, there are no less than eight—eight!—electrical outlets, and the overhead lights are more than adequate. Actually this functional work space, often so sadly lacking in even much more expensive hotels, is the real reason I am staying at the We Crociferi.  As a bonus my room, although isolated, looks directly down on the Campo dei Gesuiti  and has a great view out over the roof tops of Venice, with the dome-topped 182-foot campanile, or bell tower, of the church of Madonna dell’Orto soaring up off in the distance.

The We Crociferi on the right, in daylight

One of three courtyard at the We Crociferi

Courtyard at the We Crociferi

Courtyard at the We Crociferi

Courtyard at the We Crociferi

Arcade at the We Cruciferi

The Church of the Gesuiti, to the left of the We Crociferi. The angels on the facade are less dread-inspiring in the daylight

182-foot campanile, or bell tower, of the church of Madonna dell’Orto visible over the rooftops of Venice

Greece | Thessaly | Meteora | Kastraki

I am staying in the village of Kastraki, which is almost but not quite coterminous with the much larger town of Kalambaka. My hotel is .9 of a mile from the Kalambaka train station. I had intended to walk but just as I started off a downpour ensued. I had already gotten drenched walking to the train station in Thessaloniki but had pretty much dried my clothes with my body heat on the train. I did not want to get soaked again so I took a cab. My hotel, a small guesthouse, actually, is like many such places around here run by a couple who live on the premises. The on-line reviews said they “treat you like family,” which I definitely do not consider a recommendation. I prefer anonymous places with receptionists like those in “American Horror Story: Hotel.” It was one of the cheapest places in the village, however, so I thought I would take my chances with the dreaded “family treatment.” It turned out my fears were ungrounded. After checking in I came and went like a ghost and never saw the owners again for four days. 

The spires and peaks of Meteora loom over Kastraki. I am staying here because the village offers better access on foot to most of the Meteora monasteries than does Kalambaka. It is also much more quiet and laid back than bustling Kalambaka, which caters in large part to big tour groups. Indeed, zoning laws forbid buildings of more than two stories in Kastraki and any new buildings must be made from traditional local materials. This is an apparent attempt to keep out large hotels and maintain Kastraki’s ambience as a traditional Greek village.

On-lines guides rave about the cuisine in Kastraki and there does seem to be an inordinate amount of restaurants for a small village, but the tourist season has peaked and most now appear closed for the winter, even though it is only the last week of November. The one place I do find open at mid-afternoon serves only the most generic Greek grub at ridiculously inflated prices (the house wine, produced locally, is not bad at all, quality-wise, but at €5 a half-liter a little overpriced). Fortunately the village boasts of a fine little bakery with excellent spinach and cheese pies and chocolate croissants. These sluiced down with a bottle of local red wine (€4.00 for three-fourths of a liter) make a sufficient repast, even after a long day’s hiking on the roads and trails out of town.

Kastraki from Great Meteora Monastery (click on photos for enlargements)

Another view of Kastraki

Another view of Kastraki

Another view of Kastraki

Another view of Kastraki

Another view of Kastraki

Small church in Kastraki

Massif behind Kastraki. The cliff face is dotted with caves and fissures that were once inhabited by solitary meditators, anchorites, recluses, and misanthropes.

Another view of the massif

Another view of the massif

Another view of the massif. If you look closely you can just make out the ruins of a hermitage in the exact center of the photo.

Church in Kastraki

Upper Kastraki

Valley above Kastraki

Greece | Kavala | Muhammad Ali | Imaret

Muhammad Ali (1769–1849), whose Childhood Home, now a museum, I had visited earlier, was born in Kavala. He went on to became the Khedive of Egypt and the founder of a ruling dynasty that lasted to 1952. In 1817 he established in Kavala an Islamic college for the training of imams. Although called the Imaret, it was known locally as the Tembel Hane, or “lazy man’s home”, since those who attended the school were guaranteed free pilaf daily and were exempted from military service. According to local sources the Imaret also operated a soup kitchen which fed up to 1000 indigent people a day. The buildings of the Imaret have now been remodeling into the five-star Imaret Hotel. It is a little out of my price range: the cheapest rooms are $350 a night; suites are well over a thousand a night. Even so, the place is often sold out. Make your reservations well in advance. Guided tours are offered to those to just want to look around without actually staying in the hotel. 

Courtyard of the Imaret Hotel (click on photos for enlargements)

Courtyard of the Imaret Hotel

Courtyard of the Imaret Hotel

Cheapest room of the hotel ($350 a night) are located on this arcad

Another courtyard of the hotel

The second story of this building is a suite that goes for $1450 a night..

Washing facilites at the Imaret’s small mosque (no longer active). 

Swimming pool of the Imaret Hotel 

Looking out over the roofs of the Imaret Hotel