Jerash

Having arrived in Tel Aviv on Thursday I began to work out my plans for the trip. I had a list of places that I wanted to see but I had kept my schedule intentionally free. That was a good thing because the Middle East is a very religious place (Surprise Surprise). Strangely enough, Israel seems to be more religious than its immediate neighbors. It has a hint of theocracy about it and what that means in practical terms is that everything shuts down on the Sabbath. Most businesses including many restaurants and stores are included in this, as well as all the buses and museums. So being in Israel on a Saturday is pretty dull.The Christian, Armenian, and Arab quarters of the Old City (where I was staying) didn't all keep to this but it would have seriously hampered my movements to remain. So I took my trip across the border to Jordan a little sooner than planned. While I did get a chance to see a bit of Jerusalem that night I'm leaving that 'till the Jerusalem section later because I saw most of the city during the day after I got back from Jordan.

Getting there wasn't as easy as I'd have liked. First of the there are three border crossings to Jordan. The Sheikh Hussein one is in the north below the Sea of Galilee and the Eilat/Aqaba one is at the far south border of both countries. The third one is the Allenby/King Hussein Bridge which is near Jericho just north of the Deas Sea and is a real oddity for several reasons. Firstly they don't issue visas which means that you have to get one from the Jordanian embassy in advance. Second, it's in occupied Palestine which means that there is a mass of legal loopholes concerning it. For example, as far as Jordan is concerned people using the bridge are going into Palestine and not Israel which is good for all those people who don't want an Israeli stamp on their passport (ie. if they're traveling into any other country in the area apart from Egypt. Those are the only states that recognize Israel as a nation). Israel doesn't see things that way but are content to let in the visitors using that loophole provided that they go through a typically rigorous security check. The other strange thing about the border is that you can't take your vehicle across. That wasn't a problem for me since I was taking buses, but it must be annoying for anyone else. Fortunately, I was aiming for the Sheikh Hussein crossing in the north. My plan was to make a 2-3 day trip of it starting in the north and working my way down to the Aqaba crossing.

Crossing borders in the Middle East (or at least Israel) is a long and sometimes complicated procedure. Anyone who doesn't realize that Israel has security concerns should really not be visiting since they are probably suffering from a severe brain injury. The Sheikh Hussein Crossing consists of two different checkpoints and about a mile of no-man's land in between. You go through the Israeli side, get your passport stamped to certify you're exiting the country, pay the visa fee, and then you pay for a bus to go to the other side of the border. Once there the Jordanian authorities will ask you the same questions and charge for them to stamp your passport. They do issue visas on the spot, but the whole process takes about an hour and a half to two hours. Unfortunately for me that meant I missed one of the main attractions at my first stop, Jarash.

Lincoln (Medieval)

COMING SOON

Newark-on-Trent

Newark is a town on the bus route from Nottingham to Lincoln. I didn't realize that you could get a cheap train to Lincoln (the last trains I'd had cost over £30) so I took the bus. To get from Nottingham to Lincoln you need to get off here and hop on another bus. It's a nice little market town that I didn't mean to get stuck at for an hour. The bus stop is right over the road from this castle so I went to see it.

Avebury

Avebury may make me change my mind about Neolithic sites. It was a beautiful town. We came there for lunch and the pub gave us a limited choice of food in order to accommodate all of us. The pub has a well that supposedly contains the body of a murder victim. You'd be surprised how many wells seem to have those but this one was built right into the pub and served as a table.On the way in we passed a giant mound that is apparently the biggest Neolithic monument in Europe. It's just a big mound of earth but it is impressive to consider its scale.

Stonehenge

Stonehenge. What is there left to say about Stonehenge? I don't like it. Frankly, it's just a pile of rocks in between two motorways. I know that there are people who'd get all up in arms over that but it's just not my thing. Neolithic remains don't interest me, which is a shame really because that's what the rest of the trip was.

Getting to Stonehenge is real easy. It's located right at the junction of two highways. You don't even need to get out of your car, you can just look out the window as you drive by and see as much of them as I would want to. If you do go in for a visit you take the right fork (if you're coming from London) and there is a parking lot and small visitor centre there. There is a fee to get in, though I don't know how much, and they give you audio guides to help you walk around the circle. You can't go into the circle you just walk around the outside. They do let certain people in on rare occasions. Those crazy new age druids from Glastonbury demanded to be let in here because this is an ancient druidic holy site. Never mind that the henge predates the druids by at least 2000 years, they know better than those pesky archaeologists what this site was used for. Turns out it's for staring at the moon and chanting. How disappointing. On a slightly more realistic note Doctor Who came here last season. Somehow all those echo surveys that they make of the ground failed to pick up the giant cavern underneath the stones that the Doctor went in. Probably an oversight on their part. Anyways, to get to the henge from the visitor centre you go under the highway and a set of stairs will take you past some rather nice paintings of the henge people and up to the henge itself. Then you do a circle round the thing and come back and you can say you've done it. Hooray! Moving on...

Salisbury

Salisbury seems like a nice place. Our group stayed there overnight after doing Glastonbury. We only had that evening and the following morning (before 9) to see the city. After that they hustled us into the bus and moved on. The market square was absolutely dead when we arrived at around 7. Apparently this place is usually a bustle of activity but on Saturday evening and Sunday morning none of that was evident. It had a number of stores that would have been worth going into had they been open and the people manning the pub were friendly and served good food.

Glastonbury

I went here as part of a University organized trip. So a whole bunch of students being ferried around the country. The theme was Arthurian legends so we went to places associated with those tales. I've always loved the legend of King Arthur so it seemed like a good trip to go on. There are a lot of myths weaved around Arthur, many of them contradictory. The one place that has tried to associate itself with Arthur more than any other is Glastonbury.

In 1191 the monks at Glastonbury Abbey went so far as to claim they had found Arthur's grave. In reality they probably found a Dark Age tomb of some nobleman and his wife, but they claimed that upon it there was the inscription Hic jacet Arthurus, rex quondam rexque futurus. That's the line that gave T.H. White the title to his book The Once and Future King.which sounds rather better than the more literal translation "Here is buried Arthur, king once and king in future." The problem with it is that it was written in High Medieval Latin (Classical Latin has no J) and sketches of it (the original has disappeared) reveal it to be engraved in the then current style. It was during a time of great interest in the Arthurian story. Richard the Lionheart brought a sword supposed to be Excalibur with him on Crusade.

Delphi

Delphi is possibly the most gorgeous spot in Greece. It is not surprising that the Greeks thought this place the most holy on earth. Delphi is most famous for having the Delphic oracle, and indeed most of the remains are from the temple. I don't believe that there was much else going for the town apart from its temple. It's located high in the mountains along narrow ledges and has very little in the way of natural resources or farmland. Just getting there is a treat as the road goes through mountain ranges and valleys and various little villages. It must have required a truly extraordinary effort to get here in ancient times.

Mycenae

If you're trying to get to Mycenae from Athens don't try to catch the bus from Nafplia. That is what the sites recommend, but it is a waste of time. There are three Nafplia-Mykines buses that leave on the hour from 10 to 2. They have a tendency to cancel them with no warning. There is no need to take them though since the bus to Nafplia goes within two miles of Mycenae. Get off the bus at the stop for Fichtio, a small town about 40 minutes from Athens. Take the road opposite the bus station east to the town of Mykines. That's the modern town built up to take advantage of the tourist trade to Mycenae. It's only about a mile and a half down the road. You can go back the same way which saves having to rely on the limited buses going to Nafplia. They have buses running until about 8 or 9 so you have more time to see what you want.

Nafplia

The only reason that I went to Nafplia was because there was supposed to be a bus from there to Mycenae. Anyone traveling from Athens to Mycenae is strongly advised to AVOID THIS ROUTE. The buses can be cancelled with no warning and they only have three of them daily, which means that if you want to get back you have to leave by 3. The people manning the bus station are also the rudest I have ever encountered at any sort of public service job. They treated me as if I was only an irritation and ignored me to start talking to people who just walked in. Greeks have a tendency to be somewhat rude but this was as bad as I've seen it. Worse, it took me 15 minutes to figure out a solution which she knew the entire time. Horrible.

So what's in Nafplia? First off there's Palamidi Castle on the top of the cliffs. It is an enormous Venetian castle built on an immensely impressive rock. Many hills have castles on them, to the extent where it is boring, but Palamidi is the largest and most impressive I've seen. It is almost completely intact. There looks to be a beautiful view of the shore from up there but I didn't have time to go up it and find out. Next time.

Athens

Athens has some really wonderful sights and some really seedy areas. I find that a lot of foreign cities are like that, but what separates Athens (and Greece) is how difficult it is to tell when you're passing from one to the other. The difference between a nice safe section and a dangerous section can often be only a few feet. First off, Greek cities look really run down. Greeks don't put as much effort into maintaining cities as the Americans and British do. Even street cleaning and trash disposal is largely neglected. Areas like the Parthenon are different because of the number of tourists visiting but even there you can expect to see trash lying around on the ground. I don't think that this is a money issue. Even the areas that have money don't look fancy. Presentation is not a strong feature of Greek culture. It just isn't a big deal for them. While it becomes easier to tell the areas apart after spending some time there you should still expect to see druggies passed out on the street, homeless people, and random gangs of people wandering the streets. At least until you figure out which areas to avoid. Generally, the areas around the Acropolis are pretty safe but if you go north too far past Omonia Square you're on your own. Again, the lack of care means that all Athens looks pretty seedy, but unless you stay in your hotel room you're gonna have to face it sooner or later.

York

Modern York is an amazing city. Much of the city is old and feels it, with a complete set of city walls and an array of medieval buildings. It has the largest cathedral in England and the second largest in Northern Europe. The shopping center is a really nice section of town lined with stores and generally a market in the square. It is a very popular shopping destination. There is a Roman bath located beneath one of the pubs (helpfully called The Roman Bath) but they charge for admittance and there isn't much there.
There is very little left of Roman York. It was originally one of the civitas capitals of Britian under the name of Eboracum. It was also known as Jorvik during the Viking era and there is the excellent (but overpriced and busy) Jorvik Centre to see there. As for Eboracum there is a section of wall left as well as a few artifacts in the museum. The centre of Eboracum was located where Yorkminster Cathedral is now. The Normans liked to build Cathedrals on sites of importance since that helped associate their buildings with the prestige and importance of the old ones.

Manchester

 

There is very little in Manchester of a Classical nature since it is in most respects a very modern city. The whole city seems to be made of brick and feels very industrial Victorian. However there is the very nicely reconstructed Roman fort of Mamucium located in Castlefield, one of the nicer areas in the south-west part of town.

London and the British Museum

Since my year began in London it makes sense to start there. London is a pretty amazing city. Its history spans at least 2,000 years to the creation of Londinium by the Romans. There isn't much left from those times. Fortunately, London itself has a number of amazing places to visit. From the Tower of London to Buckingham Palace to Big Ben... The number of recognizable landmarks is endless! Unfortunately, I missed most of them. Perhaps I'll go back at a later date but for now all I've seen is Trafalgar Square and the exteriors of a lot of buildings. And the British Museum but I'll get back to that.
So what is there in London that would interest a Classics student?

Londinium Walls

Travels Through the Ancient World

This is the beginning of my travel blog. It shall contain my observations of all the countries that I travel to as well as pictures and details of my journeys. To begin with it shall include Greece, France, England, Israel, and Jordan. I expect it to expand further shortly. My main interest is in Classical Antiquity so most of these places are from that period and will reflect my interests. After all, it's MY blog! There should still be plenty of places that are interesting to a non-Classics student too. Some places are important enough to see even if they're not Classically themed and sometimes places are too nice to ignore even if nothing of historical value ever happened there.

I have a companion blog detailing my year abroad at the University of Nottingham. Any material dealing with life and education in Britain shall be found there.