Day 4 Crete – The elusive market

We got up early today in search of the Reythemon market only at to learn after searching the city that it is now a secret moving market. It apperantly moves every week to a new location and you have know someone who knows to find it. No one knew where is was today including the hotels and tourist police. We are going to Chania tomorrow and apparently they have a market everyday so we feel good about this. We did not contquer Sameria Gourge today either. We went to the front desk at our hotel to get directions only to be informed that it is almost impossible to walk the 11miles down and then back up again so we should go with an exursion that would drop us off at the top and pick us up at the bottom though this was 30 euros a piece and would still take all day. Not exactly what we thought we were getting into. So needless to say we decided to make today a beach and pool day. It was great. Very relaxing. At the beach we walked out on this little rock strip about 200 yard to a tiny white washed chapel just sitting on a grouping of rocks in the aegean sea. It was beautiful. The beach was surrounded by mountaints rising up in three directions. Clouds rolled in and with the breeze from the sea we decided to head back to the hotel where we lounged by the pool for the rest of the afternoon.

We went to a restaurant near the hotel tonight and tried the grilled feta. The most amazing thing ever! It was olive oil, tomatoes, onion, green pepper, and of course lots of feta cooked up and delicious with homemade bread.

Alas we did not see any goats today. As for yesterdays lunch video you will just have to wait for it and live with the bull video instead since we can’t seem to get the larger videos to load over here. Lets just say that lunch yesteday had the most spectacular views of the sea ever! And goats!

 

Day 3 Crete – Lost in Irakleio

We got up early and headed out to Irakleio to go to the open air market. We got really lost, that is one confusing city. We never found the market and it took us 45 mins to find out way out and get on the road to Knosos. Knosos is the palace of King Minos which was built over 4,000 years ago. We explored Knosos and then head to a winery a few miles up the road. We couldn’t do a tasting but we are bringing back a few bottles. The winery was very high up and had amazing views. To get back to the hotel from the winery we had to go back through Irakleio, needless to say we spent another 45mins lost in the city trying to get back on the road to the hotel. None of the streets are named and they go from being a 2 lane road to a very narrow alley and back again. Plus the drivers are insane weaving in and out of traffic. The highlight of the day was where we stopped for a late lunch on the road back to the hotel. Below is a short video of our experience.

For dinner we headed back to Rethymnon to walk in Old Town, found a excellent sidewalk restaurant and had wine and Gyros.
Tomorrow we are going to conquer Samaria Gorge!

 

Day 2 Crete – Mmmm Gyros

Well I think our craziness of last week, doses of nyquil and the traveling over an ocean finally caught up with us since we slept for 14 hours straight last night waking up at 2pm local time. We are well rested now. We explored Rethymno harbour a town about 10mins from where we are staying in today. Had a lunch of Gyros stuffed with fries ( thats how they serve them here) After lunch we explored the shops that had hand embriodered linens, carved olive wood and paintings. We then headed up the hill to the Venitian fortress which had amazing views of the harbor. We took tons of pictures and videos of the fortress and its many structures including the Ibrahim Han Mosque which was originally the Venetian Cathedral. After the fortress we drove inland along the narrow hilly country roads. At one point Jessica got us wedged down a crooked alley that shrunk in size as we drove deep down the alley. Eventually getting us so stuck that we had to reverse back down the entire alley, thankful the only thing harmed in the process was a misplaced tree. We did seem to entertain the local old men with our antics. We went to a really great little market and bakery in a small village, very tasty. In the market there were casks of wine mounted on the wall. We filled a water bottle full for .75 euros pretty cheap! We also got some great views of goats chillin in the road eating weeds from rocks and mountainous terrain. We have no just got back to the hotel from dinner we ate at a cute sidewalk restaurant – we had pizza( which seems pretty popular here) and wine. they also bring out toast points looked like large croutons with butter and the best olive spread. They also brought out dessert of banana, apple with honey and nuts with some whipped cream on top very yummm!

Tomorrow we are going to Irakleio to a street marked hoping to find some local olives! And then we are going to a winery.

 

Day 1 Crete

We arrived in crete safe and sound. The landscape is very different here – rocky, mountainous, and there are mountain goats on the side of the road. We are having great weather nice breeze and about 78 degrees. We got in at about 6:30 crete time, 11:30 maryland time. We had barely enough time to run to the next planes on both layovers but on the second one we actually were delayed about 45mins. Anthony and I can barely keep our eyes open. I actually nodded off during dinner haha. Well we are going to head out. we will get on again tomorrow, and keep you posted.

 

Here before we know it.

The wedding is just around the corner at 10 days! We are getting pretty excited, especially to see everyone! We are incredibly lucky to have such wonderful friends and family take time out of their lives to help us celebrate our special day. After a year and a half of planning it’s hard to believe that the wedding is just next weekend. Our entire family has been hard at work finishing the final details that will hopefully create a memorable weekend for everyone. We hope everyone attending the ceremony and reception have a marvelous time.

A lot of people have been asking us where we will be heading after the wedding for our honeymoon. Thanks to Anthony’s parents gift of a week at a time-share resort we were able to choose any location we wanted. After searching the globe for a location that wasn’t in hurricane territory, was relaxing but had plenty of activities nearby we decided on the island of Crete! We are super excited about this trip. Neither of us have been to Greece and this will actually be Anthony’s first trip outside of the US. We will be leaving on the red-eye Sunday evening and after 3 flights we will arrive in Crete at 5 pm on Monday. We are looking forward to visiting all the historical sites, wineries and basking in the sun on the Mediterranean. We will also be spending one day/night in Athens on our return trip where we will get to visit the Acropolis, which has been on my must see list since childhood. For all those inquiring minds here are a few facts about Crete!

Crete is Greece’s largest and southernmost island

Crete is the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean.

The people of Crete refer to themselves as Cretan, not Greek.

Crete is believed to be the birthplace of Zeus.

Crete has been ruled by the Romans, Arabs, Venetians, Turks and was even occupied by the Germans during WWII.

Crete is home to Samaria Gorge, the longest gorge in Europe.

There are more than 3000 caves in Crete.

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Weddings Galore

Seems our lives are surounded by happy couples and wedding talk these days. Between my sisters recent marraige, our own wedding plans and now my youngest sisters. Thats right folks my sister Kelly has now decided to jump in the fold as she has recently become engaged. Congratulations Kelly and Alex! I look forward to being a part of your special day.

 

Family Dinner Weekend

As I have mentioned before my oldest sister Kara and Andy her long time boyfriend were recently married in a small ceremony in Chapel Hill, NC. Well last weekend the whole LaFleur-Willard clan got together to celebrate these two wonderful people and their marraige. We had a great time staying in Chapel Hill at the Rigmor House playing kickball, horseshoes, singing around the bonfire and eating!  Check out   http://andykara.smugmug.com/ for all the photos.

Toasting the happy couple

The sisters

 

Save the Date

We have finally sent all the save the dates out. It is a big relief to have those in the mail. We had an appointment at the post office for 8am Saturday to get our passports so we made it our goal to place the save the dates in the mail then. On top of getting our Save the Dates in the mail we also got our passports ordered. Which we will definetly need for our honeymoon to Greece! This will be Anthonys first trip outside the U.S. and we are very VERY excited about it! We have our hotel booked but we still have to work out the flights and other details. No matter what it’s sure to be an awesome trip.

 It was a very early and productive Saturday morning for us and to reward ourselves we got coffee and bagel sandwiches from Market Street Bagels! They are, in my opinion at least, the BEST bagels in town. All made fresh and they have tons of different flavors. I had the jalopeno chedder bagel, spicy and very yummy! 

A special Thank you to Anthony’s Mom and cousin Jeanette – We couldn’t have gotten the Save-the-Dates all done in time if it wasn’t for your help,  Thank You – Thank You!!

 

Yum Yum

We had our menu tasting last weekend at Duffy’s for the reception. Everything was beautifully presented and very delicious! I can’t wait for everyone to try all the yummy food and I hope you all enjoy it as much as we did.

We have made a lot of progress with planning in the past few weeks. We now have photography and dj, I am very relieved to have those taken care of. Anthony and I did a ton of research to find the perfect photographer and dj for our wedding. Below are the links to their websites, we went with Knights of the Turntable for the dj and Rachel Naft at RMN Photography for the photographer.  We are confident that they will help make our wedding a memorable day for everyone.

http://www.rmnphotography.com/

http://www.knightsoftheturntable.com/

 

Flora and Fauna

Don’t worry no wild animals (including Sydney) will be present at the wedding. Though I still think it would be cool to have Sydney(our bearded dragon) be the cake topper. Haha.

This weekend we met with the florist Ginger, who happens to be a friend of my Mothers. She was great and took all of my crazy ideas and turned them into some that will be beautiful and unique. I am very excited to see how it all turns out. We decided to go with not just one color for the flowers but 3. Green, Purple and White, though they will all for the most part be used separately since I like monochromatic arrangements. Below is a few of the arrangements that inspired me during my floral search.