Crete: Prologue

To make up for my stress induced absence these past weeks, I'm going to recount my holiday in Crete. It has however only just begun, so this is just what happened yesterday. Lucky you gets to stick around for a week of firther, at least semi daily updates. So enjoy the following unedited accounts of my fun packed life.This starts a few hours into the plane journey in which I decided to try some writing exercises, so expect florid prose.


_____________________________________

This tray seems not to be able to support my weight. Or rather that of my arms. It's coffee stained arms visibly ache at the force I inflict upon them

A nameless city passes below, visibility scarred by the occasional cottonbud cloud. I am mildly amused at how small metal rooves blind me from way down there. It's not so amazing, clearly, and I'm more amased at the amusement itself. But it s not amazing. It's just light. Consider the fact that it comes from the fucking sun. As does this blasted heat.

It's a curious thing. The plane is air conditioned, but it still feels like the entirity of the sun's head rests on my shoulder.

The city is gone and a river now snakes below. Eesh. A snaking river? How unoriginal. Oo. Mountains. Now that's beauty. Great structures crowned in cloud, testement to this ball of molten rock that we live on's power.

Already I have ink on my fingers.

There are different levels of cluds. you don't really think about it but I suppose it must be true. Well of coruse it is, I just saw it. But yeah, we do tend to think it goes land, sky, cloud layer, sky, space. Clearly this is wrong.

Mountaintops peer through the cotton blanket, like stone cats, curious about the midge flying above.

It's 1650. I'm going to try to read again.
_____________________________________

1735, and I have just noticed we are over the sea, and even from up here it seems gloriously, imposingly endless. The blue seems undefined and unless you look carefully you fail to see even the largest ripple/wave/whatever it's called out here. The sea merges with the sky at the Horizon so flawlessly, one would be hard pressed not to imagine that we had accidentally flown into a void in space where we are surrounded on all sides by infinite blue. Or finite blue, for the claustrophobic.
The Horizon itself  is a spectacle and seems to be the only place around with clouds. Two lines of them appear to ring us, so parrallel that I can't be sure where the Horizon actually is.

Small patterns of ice are forming around the small scratches on the window. I daren't stare for too long, unprotected as I am from the sun by the aforementioned clouds. It seems that living in Britain has literally sheltered me.

_____________________________________

My mind: "Holy fuck, I can see that wave! It must be fucking huge!" And indeed it would be were it not a mountain. We're back over land it seems. Still no clouds nearby, and the coast is still visible so the Horizon is still poorly defined. Not a problem, just and observation.

I have noticed that I write Horizon with a capital H. I blame the BBC.

The sea of water has been fully replaced by an ocean of mountains. A range of mountains. A mountain range, if you will, the tips of which twist and disect, like the veins of a body.
Sunlight casdaces onto the sea-facing mountainside, leaving the other side drenched in shadow. Fog and clouds fill the valleys of the further away ones like hands cupping water.

I accidentally looked at the sun. These plane windows leave no room for warning.

One of the ice formations looks like a skeleton. Ominous. Others look like ice. WHAT COULD THIS MEAN!?

Another river. Let's think of a better description than snake: March? Could a river march? Not really, too rhythmic.

My thoughts are getting dull. Back to reading. It is 1809
_____________________________________

1819 and the surroundings have taken on a rich blue hue, complementedby the now obviously setting orange sun. The horizon is a rich red, following a pale rainbow unpwards to the flawless blue sky. I dare to look into the sun again, and find my gaze briefly trapped, a willing pain sacrificed to glimps its beauty. We are over water again, the liquid mass now dotted with islands. We reach our destination soon.

The captain informas us that we just passed over Athens. I offer a silent prayer for the ancient centre of knowledge.

I am still in awe with the sunset, though mostly with the rainbow horizon. My fellow passengers squander the view chatting while I pull my eyes away only to describe it to you, my reader. Closest to the sun the colours are the most vivid. Scratch that. The sun is gone. Only a glourious band of colour remains, welcoming the night.

A single white pin of light in the navy sky appears to welcome us, and a brief weightlessness indicates our decent. The Horizon, for now it deserves the capital H, appears as if it were ablaze.

Welcome to Crete.
_____________________________________

1905, UK time. What the fuck timezone am I in now anyway? Waiting for luggage. Everything is delightfully beige. I use the term 'delightfully'  in a broad, and in fact fallacious sense. It is in stark contrast to the Hollywood shimmer and gleam of Bristol. I'll leave you a couple of seconds for that one to sink in.

It's ok really. Warm, but not unpleasantly so. Then again, it is night. Look forward to the likening of the day's heat to an oppressive dictatorship.

Goodnight sinners.


_____________________________________

EDIT: This being Greek internet, and thus Google thinking I am in fact Greek, spell check thinks everything is misspelt, so, sorry for any typos.