Thursday AM - Chania

Dinner last night was memorable, if for no other reason than we got to see how Cretans really do in fact eat ALOT... a WHOLE lot.  An ridiculous lot.  There were six of us, and there was easily enough food  prepared to serve somewhere between 18-24 people.  But it was a sumptuous feast, well deserved after a long, hot hike for Jeff and Mark (the rest of us also had a very difficult day too, lounging at the beach under umbrellas, getting served frosty drinks and food, and even getting a 30 minute massage for about 15 Euros... the good life indeed). The sea was warm and amazingly shallow - 100 yards out and we were still in waist deep water that was amazingly clean and clear...clearer than Hawaii.

 Sunrise in Chania

Our intrepid hikers.  Jeff promises to post to the blog with details and pictures of their hike. They left the house at 7:20 AM and got back a little after 8:00, just in time for dinner.

The start of our chef's dinner. She dressed the table with lavender, lemon verbena and mint. All the herbs here are very pungent - much more so than America, probably due to the poor soils they grow in.

The menu included Greek olives served with feta, a Greek version of a caprese salad (their tomatoes here are amazing - like home-grown garden tomatoes from the backyard), another savory salad that included watermelon and cucumber, stuffed calimari (huge animals, probably 2-3 feet, not the little ones like we get at home, so their was plenty of space to stuff deliciousness into the squid), shrimp linguine, a Greek version of panna cotta, and a cakey-coconuty desert made with mastic, topped with a candle to celebrate Jim's birthday (a few days early, but considering Jim's the guy who invented "birthday seasons", we figured, why not?)

The Chef

Jeff has promised a post detailing the adventure in the Sumerian Gorge - stay tuned...!