HERAKLION | CRETE | GREECE | CRETAN CULTURE AND HISTORY!! | CRETE SERIES P1

crete is the largest and most southern island of greece and i was drawn to visit this beautiful island because of its incredibly diverse landscapes rich history dating back thousands of years and strong cultural traditions that are still practiced today crete is divided into four regions from the western side as hania then raid them note then heracleon also the name and location of crete's capital city and finally lesithi in the east in the series i'll be traveling across the island and learning all about the culture and history of each one of these regions [Music] so [Music] i'm here in the cultural capital of crete heraklion and this is where i'll be starting my journey through the island of crete so i've come to the old venetian harbour there is this incredible historic rocker damari fortress behind me which was built by the venetians and i'm gonna go and have a look inside and also see the views from the top of the fortress [Music] here at the top of the fortress you get a really beautiful view to the old town of heraklion and the ocean and the mountains it's such an idyllic setting it's almost hard to imagine that it was built by the venetians to ward off from threats of invasion it's just a great piece of history to come and see when you're in heraklion inside the fort there's a really interesting exhibition which explains in more detail the occupation of the venetians on the island of crete and has some amazing artifacts like a room full of hundreds of cannonballs [Music] [Applause] the minoans are thought to be the most ancient european civilization that originated here on the island of crete and in the last century lots of excavations have been happening across the island and several famous minoan palaces and ruins have been discovered so i'm currently in one of those which is the malia minoan ruins unlike the more well-known and famous canosa palace which is visited by a lot of tourists this palace hasn't had any restoration work done so you really need to use your imagination to restore this palace to its former glory greek legend has it that king minos the famous king who ruled over kenosha's palace his brother sarpadon ruled here in the malia palace many of the artifacts that were uncovered from excavations of the malia palace can be found at the heraklion archaeological museum in the center of town the most famous find is a precious gold bee pendant which is still in perfect condition the bee is a potent symbol of crete from ancient times because honey was widely traded throughout the region and the bee also represents fertility other famous artifacts include the minoan snake goddess sculptures which indicate that women enjoyed a high status in minoan society because of their elaborate costumes and physical gracefulness you can buy these sculptures in the form of souvenirs in many of heraklion shops the city of heraklion is really lively and vibrant especially in the evenings when locals and visitors gather outside in the many cafes and bars and wander the streets to do some window shopping there's lots of locals about and you get a real sense of the greek culture there are also lots of great historical attractions like the famous moroccini lions fountain built by the venetians in the 1600s it's a bigger city than other more touristy towns on the island but you do get a real feel of the local way of life [Music] what many people don't know about the island of crete is that it's made up of some incredible incredible mountain ranges so today i've decided to go up into the mountain range in a jeep and experience what i think will be a more local way of living in crete so i'm just headed to meet my guide now and then we're going to head up into the dicty mountain range hello good morning how are you today i'm very well i'm melini i'm petra nice to meet you [Music] on the way to the mountains we stopped at the beautiful ahios yordhyos monastery which is very well known because locals consider it a sign of bad luck if you pass it by without stopping to light a candle petra also told me it would be good to light one for our safe travels ahead [Music] oh what's that wild oregano oregano it smells so good you can put it in your salad tonight [Music] this is what we call vasco vasco milo it's wild sage oh wild sage strong oh that smells incredible [Music] oh there's so many goats but then they're so cute [Music] petra took me to see a local friend of hers katarina who is an amazing 77 year old woman who grows and sells her own produce from her farm is that the honey that she makes yes wow honeycomb oh oh try it that's so sweet mommy look can we look there's deleting the milk nowadays they have a kind of yeast and the old days they did this just simply with vinegar or lemon caperina oh you can try if you like oh okay fresh fresh from the milk it's it's still got water be careful not to throw it on yourself these are great crepes so because they know her they come right because they're not scared of her katharina has just brought us here to see the goat so she actually has some way of calling them all over she says ella now which has come here and they all come so you can see them all running towards us now and um she's just been showing us some of the things that she grows in her farm so grapes and walnuts such a beautiful setting such a beautiful place to live and to grow your fresh fruit and fresh vegetables [Music] on our way to la sisi plateau now and we just got off here at this viewpoint just walked down and you can see behind me the have house gorge it's one of the many gorges that you can hike here in the island of crete and it's absolutely stunning it's beautiful views to come and admire got a little friend who's come for a little snack wild mountain goats wow there's another one [Music] [Music] so we've come down to the la sisi plato and i think this is you said one of the most fertile places is island of crete yes and they grow a lot of vegetables here so you see tomatoes peppers peppers beans but the city is famous for the potatoes for the potatoes so that's the most famous thing that's grown in the la sisi plateau you can see also these windmills behind us they were using them there were many many until the year that the electricity came to the plateau which was in 1950 there were over 10 000 of these kind of windmills but then slowly slowly they were starting to use electric pumps because they used them to pump up the water to pump up and irrigate the land yes okay and then they started to use electric water pumps so slowly they disappeared but still there are some are they trying to do any kind of renovation of the windmills and kind of bring them back well there is a a group of young farmers they are talking about maybe reintroducing those old kind of windmills again would be good it's pretty and of course the windows the wind is free you know wind is free it was an incredible experience seeing how locals live in crete and exploring the stunning interior of the island [Music]

Channel: Malini Angelica

Views: 532,940

Keywords: #travelvlog, #vlog, #heraklion, #crete, #greece

Id: Yh8LWVhLYgE

Length: 11min 9sec (669 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 13 2022