Arrival to Crete and to ARCHELON

Wednesday Sepetmber 2

Today I boarded the plane to Crete where I am going to work with an organization called ARCHELON: a non-profit organization aimed at helping an endangered sea turtle species, the loggerhead, survive.

I have been traveling for over 10 days so far, but I have always known someone on the other side of the trip. In Alaska I was with my mom, cousins and and grandparents, and after flying alone to Greece, I stayed with family as well. Today is the first time I am really traveling alone. It is really daunting. The night before my flight I could not fall asleep. Surprisingly, I became extremely nervous. I thought to myslef "What am I doing?" "Have I made a mistake?"

Well... hopefully my anxieties and nerves will disappear.

In Crete a friend of my father picked me up. Loukia, a Creten lady from Chania (the town where I will be working) spoke as much English as I speak Greek, which is not a lot. That made the car ride extremely funny. We tried to communicate but most of the times we failed, so we laughed.
When she pulled up to the campsite where I'll be living, she asked in her very broken English "Come my house?" This was histerical and I could not stop laughing for a minute or so.
I have never been camping so I hada very similar reaction. But I got out of the car, introduced myself and put up my tent, relatively quickly.

The leader of the camp, John Colins told me to relax today, and I would start working tomorrow.