The Greek Trip: 5/21 The Old Fort and off to Athens

I stayed an extra day in Corfu rather than spend two in Athens.

What a wise decision. A few days previously Antonious was able to make an appointment with his good friend, the Superintendent of the Old Fort. She received her PhD from the Sorbonne in Archeology. She was happy to give us, not new for Antonious, a tour of the not open to the public parts of the fort.

We are going to go up onto the battlements to the left. The mainland is to the right and the first moat is below us. This structure housed some of the various needs when the fort was attacked, food, supplies and munitions, etc. behind massive walls.

Turing 90 degrees to the left on the entrance bridge, built for the public, you can see the Superintendant and Antonious walking ahead towards the entrance and Maria turned, waiting for me.

We enter the, as yet, not reconstructed, part of the fort. (The buildings are contemporary)

We have walked to a corner of the fort. Gun emplacements, you can't see them,

are on the top. On the right is an above ground, immediately available, munitions storage room. The entrance to the levels below is on the left. In front, Antonious, the Superintendant, an employee who carries a flashlight, and Maria.

Going down.

The first level, with rather low ceiling height. Lower left is a cut out in the floor to allow daylight to go to the second level. In the middle distance is a well for water for long duration stays.

Looking down into the second level.

Looking off in the other direction into the distance towards the bowels of the fort, where there are no openings for light.

Time exposure on the second level. Not really this bright.

Time exposure at the third level. The green you see is sea water, lit from an opening in the base of the wall. Available for non-drinking purposes.

Back above ground. The newer part building was built by the British in the mid 1800's. You can see evidence of war damage on the older wall. What appears to be a cross on top of the fort is actually a semaphore structure built by the British in the early 1800's for communication with the war ships in the harbor.

Antonious's father did some of his military training here in 1952. He was stationed across the hall from the bottom window, third from the left.

Antonious pointing that out. You can see that there is another moat between where we are and the main body of the fort. So, two moats with the part we are on (were in) a fortification between the "world" and the main fort.

Back in the public part of the fort, standing on the entrance way. You can see the closed gate to the other rampart on the left. We are still on the first of the two fort structures/walls. Antonious is talking with the Superintendant.

Into the main fort. Between two more ramparts you see the British hospital built in the early 1800's and now restored. An island in the foreground and part of Corfu in the distance.

A quick glimpse of what are locally called the "Dolphin" boats. Hydroplane. They are fast ferries from Albania. To the left of the green covered building, being rehabbed, is a four story building that had an extra floor added later. The dark yellow color between it and the building to it's left is the entrance street to Antonio and Maria's home.

In an above ground prison built in 1776 is part of an art installation left at the request of the Superintendant. Antonious's colleague used the metaphor of images burned into the skin of prisoners in Athens prisons as "pieces" hung in all the openings of the prison

A drawing on the wall done by a British prisoner in 1911.

Back outside again you are looking down at one of the higher gun emplacements.

You can see the green building and to it's left the entrance to Maria and Antonious's street. Their house is directly below the stern of the dark hulled tourist boat. You can see two others in the left distance.

Beyond the two big boats is Antonious'. Underneath the gun emplacements is the space that has been converted into the galleries used by the students for their exhibition. Many kinds of exhibitions and music events happen there.