When we parked our diesel-powered Peugeot outside the gates of the Palace of Knossos, we waited until the tree branches stopped falling atop of the car before exiting. With each gust of wind, new tree limbs separated and slammed onto the hood of our rental car. The rental car we had elected not to insure. The Peugeot was sturdy though, and my wife and I were determined not to let a little wind spoil the highlight of our Greek honeymoon on the island of Crete.
The former home of King Minos was carved into the side of a hill and sprawled several stories across several acres of Cretan landscape. You can say it’s labyrinthine. In fact, you’re obligated to say it’s labyrinthine since legend has it that this palace inspired the myth of the labyrinth. When you look at the setup, it’s not hard to imagine a bunch of children being fed to a half-man half-bull minotaur inside its corridors. Paige and I waited at the top of the entrance. We were fourth in line, our anticipation growing as we waited to enter this historic maze.
At least until a small Greek man in a funny hat pulled away from the ticket counter to make an announcement.
“EXCUSE ME LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE MONUMEMT IS NOW CLOSED FOR THE REST OF THE DAY DUE TO THE WIND. IT IS TOO DANGEROUS TO ALLOW MORE PEOPLE TO ENTER THE RUIN. PLEASE COME BACK TOMORROW.”
No, no, no, no, no. There was no “come back tomorrow” for us. Tomorrow we would be on a plane to Athens. If we wanted to get lost in a castle allegedly built to hide the offspring of a queen who hid in a wooden cow suit so she could be fucked by a white bull that her husband was supposed to sacrifice to the god Poseidon, we had to do it now.
We took stock of the scene. Our fellow linemates who were also denied entry were thick in their protest. We thought about playing the “we’re on our honeymoon and this is the only thing we came to Crete to see and we fly out tomorrow” card, but at this point the man with the funny hat was giving the same rebuttal without listening to further arguments. The decision was made. The people we watched purchase tickets and enter the ruins ahead of us would be the last admitted for the day. If they were given a concussion from flying debris, so be it, but the rest of us would not be given the opportunity. Our tourism dollars and Greece’s bankrupt economy be damned.
I started to panic. I pulled away from the crowd to take stock of the situation. I ventured around the edge of the entrance, looking for some clue to gain admittance while the attendant with the funny hat was distracted by the throngs of visitors detailing how he had just ruined their day. There was a trickle of tourists walking out of a path off to the side. I gestured to Paige, and my bride and I slowly eased closer to the source. We moved stealthily, as to not alert anyone of our covert aims to solve this riddle of entering Knossos during monsoon season. We realized we had found the exit of the ruins, and it was completely unsupervised.
I looked my wife in the eyes, seeing if she was following the same clues as I to solve how we would get inside. She responded with a single word.
“Yup.”
After double checking that the only visible employee was still occupied with mutinous tourists declaring their outrage over the injustice they had been given, Paige and I darted through the back gate. Our goal was to quickly embed ourselves deep enough into the ruins to appear we had always been there. It wasn’t difficult to do. Once we had made entry, the zigs of walkways and zags of corridors disguised any discernible path and made it simple to appear in the middle of a tour that had begun before the hurricane winds forced the closure of the ruin.
We were inside the labyrinth. Now we just had to figure out where we were supposed to go.
We paused to consider our surroundings. We were far from the only ones inside the ruins, but judging from my wife’s hair standing on end, we were certain the staff would soon be in the process of shutting down the attraction. I removed my hat and stuffed it into my back pocket so it wouldn’t blow off, allowing the gusts to blast my bangs into a cow lick. We spotted the man with the funny hat. He was slowly plodding down from his post at the entrance, having sealed it from additional money paying customers, and was starting the process of hurrying up the remaining guests as quickly as possible to the exit. Our afternoon had become a game of Pac-Man.
As Paige inspected a placard with a map, I bent down to pick up a weird seed pod that had blown off a tree and a rock that had chipped off from a wall. I inspected them closely and placed my treasures in my pocket. Satisfied with her research, Paige told me to follow her, but we only took a few steps before I heard a scratchy voice behind me shouting in Greek. I ignored it. The yelling increased. As I looked around, I knew there was no one else these angry Greek commands could be meant for. Shit. It got us.
Wincing from the wind blowing in my face, I turned to see a Greek woman. I mentally prepared to be escorted out of the ruins and charged with trespassing. I decided we could plead ignorance and avoid getting in trouble for breaking and entering, but for the second time in a five-minute span I felt my dreams of experiencing the stomping grounds of the Minotaur vanishing.
She was furious, but I noticed that her pulsing Greek cursing was accentuated with aggressive hand gestures. She kept repeating the same phrase and pointing to the ground. She wasn’t acting like she wanted us to follow her, she just stayed in place, thrusting her index finger downward and spitting venom. Still unsure of what was happening, I got an idea. I slipped my hand into my pocket and dramatically removed the rock, placing it on the ground like an armed robber surrendering his firearm to a police officer with his gun drawn. As soon as the rock was back in the dirt, the angry Greek woman muttered something, turned her back, and walked toward the exit without indicating we were supposed to follow.
I looked at Paige, shrugged, and turned the corner. Once I felt safely out of sight of any pursuers, I found two new rocks and put them in my pocket.
Page and I pushed further in. We found the dolphin room that contained the shittiest looking dolphin pictures I’ve seen in a while, and the big painted columns next to a painting of kids jumping over a bull that shows up in all the tourism photos. You can only see the bull’s ass—the top half has been lost to history from grave robbers or assaults from the wind hurtling seed pods at it for a millennium. We followed a rope-railing to a lower section, but as we turned on to the stairwell our path was blocked by a sterned faced Greek man in a funny hat.
Fuck. I guess this was it.
We slowed, attempting to blend with the other nearby tourists who have been granted legal access and actually paid for a ticket. But it was too late. The Greek man in the funny hat had me.
“I’m sorry sir. But this part is unsafe because of the wind, I cannot allow you to go down these stairs. Please continue down the other path.”
I assured him that was no problem. After all, safety first.
We found an English-speaking tour group and used them as a disguise. The strength in numbers made it more difficult to be split off and eliminated by the museum staff. We kept within earshot of the tour leader—and even learned few fun facts about some peacock-looking things etched into the walls. As we left one of the bathhouses, I asked Paige what we had left to see. She flipped through a guidebook in her backpack with less urgency than before. We were getting lazy. And we paid the price. The man with the funny hat found us.
“I’m sorry sir. But the palace is too dangerous because of the wind. We are asking everyone to leave for your own safety. Would you please follow me to the nearest exit?”
We obeyed. He had us. Our time in the labyrinth was now over.
“I am so sorry, can we give you a free ticket to come back tomorrow?”
I stuck my hand in my pocket and fingered the rocks and seed pod—my trophies from a successful assault on the Minoan palace.
“No thanks, I think we saw everything. Besides, tomorrow we’re leaving Crete.”
