Tiryns, Nafplio and Mycenae

After leaving the museum in Argos we hit our first real archaeological sites outside of Athens. Conveniently for us the well-preserved sites at Tiryns and Mycenae, the Argos museum and the town of Nafplio are all within about half an hour of each other.

The first stop after the museum was at Tiryns, a Mycenean palace known for its big walls.

Here we are entering the walls. The path runs clockwise so that the people inside the settlement, to the left in this picture, can sit on the wall and attack the enemies' unprotected right sides without worring about their shields on the left. Notice that some of these stones in the wall are as big as we are, and significantly heavier. Later Greeks coined the term Cyclopean to describe ruins like these because they didn't beleive that humans could build something out of such giant chunks of rock, and figured that cyclopes must have done it.
Tiryns isn't built on a big hill like most Mycenean settlements, but you can still sea a bay of the Mediterranean and the mountains across the way.
I think these are fruit trees.
This valley is pretty fertile, at least by Greek standards.
NaDea and Ana leaving through the main gate. Again, notice the size of those stones.

After the tour of Tiryns we drove to the coastal town of Nafplio to eat and wander around for a little bit. It was the original capital of modern Greece before the king insisted that they move it to the tiny village that was Athens, but that day it looked pretty quiet. The guys and Deanna split off and we ate in the shade at this little taverna.

The city doesn't have any ancient ruins, but it does have some fortification.
This castle is medieval and I think it was built by Venetians.
There was a fort out in the harbor that has apparently been used as a prison, a restaurant and a nightclub, at least.
There were also lots of fish.

Afterward we hit the more impressive site at Mycenae. At Tiryns only the remains of the palace itself were visible, but Mycenae also has remnants of houses and such, as well as grave circles and big tombs.
The site from the road. Like most ancient strongholds, Mycenae was built on top of a hill next to a larger mountain. The hill makes the site easily defensible and gives a great view, and through some geological process or another water makes its way down from the mountain and bubbles up in springs and wells on top of the nearby hill.
Here we are approaching the Lion's Gate.
Named after the relief of two lions overlooking the path into the city.
The stones involved are huge.
A nice view, including some of the remains of houses.
Grave circle A, where some of the neat stuff in the National Museum was found.
A sally port. These were back doors that troops could use to leave and harass a beseiging army. Because they're only big enough for one or two men at a time, there was no chance of the enemy army getting troops in.
One of the nearby mountains.
Later in their history the Mycenaeans started building beehive-shaped tholos tombs for their aristocracy. They've been empty for millennia, since anyone walking by could tell that they had neat stuff, but they're still pretty impressive.
Here's the long path into one.
And here's a shot of the inside.

After leaving Mycenae we drove straight to Piraeus, the port just south of Athens, to board the ferry for Crete. There were four of us in the cabin that night, so that was pretty cramped, but all of us spent most of the evening sitting out on deck enjoying the breeze. Mom called me that night, but between the reception and the wind I couldn't hear her very well.