Lazy day - ruins, tost, pomegranates, and the silent joy of doing nothing

Today (Tuesday) was a slow day for us-even slower than yesterday. Tim had some work to do in the morning, and we really didn't head out until around 1:30. We drove just up the coast to the ruins of Phaselis-another town that was founded by Greeks (7th century BC, as an outpost of Rhodes). Like Olympos, it was a shipping port that waxed and waned under the influence of pirates and earthquakes, and like Olympos, it underwent revitalization by the Romans and later became Christianized during the Byzantine Empire.
The town has a great situation on a little peninsula with three pretty bays. The ruins are more complete than Olympos, with a main plaza still partially paved with marble, a bath, a small theater, and the ruins of shops that lined the main street (with a pedestrian walkway along the shop fronts). A good part of the pretty arched aqeduct still stands. There was also a necropolis (burial ground) along the shore of one of the bays, and some of the tombs were still buried in the hill, while others had toppled out and lay broken on the shore.
It looks like a postcard-perfect setting, but the signs mentioned that ancient texts refer to it sort of a crappy place to live “frequently plagued by wasps and malaria, which the residents blamed on the sailors that visited the town.”
Since we arrived a bit later in the afternoon, Tim was hungry (again), and we were happy to see an enterprising, barrel-chested guy selling sandwiches and drinks out of his small boat, which was moored in the central bay. We got “tost,” sort of a panini kind of sandwich with cheese, salami, and tomatoes, and two glasses of pomorangagranate juice. We’re getting our fill of antioxidants this week for sure!
He had two kinds of pomegranates-the bright red ones we see at home (only like 4 times bigger) and one with a light green rind. We have seen these in the markets here too, and I tried to ask him about it.

“This one (red) is different than this one (green). Why is it different?”

“This white, this red.”
“Yes I see. But is it different inside?”

“This one white, this one red.”
“But do they taste different?"

“This one WHITE! This one RED!”
OK, I get it. One is White. One is Red.

We stopped to pick one up in the market on the way back to Cirali. I just cracked it open on a tree-the seeds are pink rather than ruby red and sweeter than the red kind-and they are much less astringent. Yum!

The most striking thing about these ruins was the partial mosaics that were uncovered in the bath complex. One was a pretty intricate black and white pattern-and the other consisted of a border of linked blue and red hearts.

The mosaic tiles were about a half-inch square. Only a small portion was uncovered-it was impossible to tell how much of the floors were still there, because most of the area was still covered with about 4 inches or dirt. I dug around in it a bit with my shoe and there seemed to be quite a bit more under there.

At the entrance to the public plaza area, there was a jumble of carved columns, pedestals, and cornices that apparently no one knew what to do with, so they were somewhat arranged for us to admire. A favorite running ornamental border was a repeat of grapes and vine leaves. There was also a cool lion's head above some dentil border. Seeing these lovely pieces in marble helped you realize that this was once probably a gorgeous little town. We just see the ghost of its former self-the bare building blocks with all the marble and beauty stripped away. It’s a bit like trying to imagine a beautiful human face from a bare skull, or trying to reconstruct what Austrailipithacus really looked like from just one brow bone and a piece of jaw.

After enjoying the ruins we took a swim in the south bay, which was warm and clear, and then swam out to the mouth of the bay and around the rocky promontory that separated it from the central bay, where Tost Man was tied up. It sounds more adventurous than it was-you could stand up most of the way. But it was a lovely afternoon and just knowing that you were swimming in an ancient port was cool-I’m sure no one swam in it back then. It was probably filthy!
We drove back to Bellerophon and immediately hit the beach. The sun was already behind the big mountain but we enjoyed the cool later afternoon listening to the little waves, the occasional bark of a dog somewhere in town, and at 6:30, the muezzin’s call to prayer. Tim took a nap, and then went in to work.
I stayed out on the beach chair until the stars started winking in, enjoying the luxury of not only doing absolutely nothing, but feeling not one bit guilty about it.

Phaselis bay (above)