Blogs from Central Greece, Greece, Europe - page 16

We left Kalambaka on the 14th and headed by long, windy, mountain bus south west to Delphi, home of the Oracle. We arrived late and found a hotel with a great view overlooking the Bay of Corinth. We went this morning to the Temples of Apollo and Athena that are on Mount Parnassos, overlooking a beautiful valley. ALOT of climbing though! Ancient Greeks were in shape :) Then it was off by Bus along the coast to Patra and our connection to Nafplia. We have decided to slow down our itinerary a bit and skip Olympus. It was a bit out of our way, and considering neither of us are Olympic Athletes (we know this judging by our climbing lately), we thought it would be best to continue to this port town of Nafplia and partake ... read more

Another rough night for me. Even though this seems like a quiet sleepy little town last night sounded like a 4th of July celebration. I started the night off with my windows and curtains open in order to get a nice breeze coming through but the street below my balcony must have had a sign saying "Hang out here". There were people yakking all night. When I put my foam air plugs in my ear the talking became a dull drone, just as I was falling asleep somebody broke a bottle. Then the disco must have let out because there was a new commotion below. I think I heard a couple firecrackers a little later. I finally shut the windows, put in the ear plugs, stripped off the sheets and my clothes and dealt with it. ... read more

Unfortunately we were the first pick up so the first hour and a bit was spent driving around Athens to various hotels. Anyway, by 11:30am we were in Delphi and boy it was worth it! We had an excellent guide take us through the museum and talk us through the various statues, unbelievably well done from 380BC through to the Hellenistic and Roman periods (very modern 4th century statues!) Then off to the Oracle of Delphi, a pagan temple where important people would come and be told prophesies from the priests who would communicate through Apollo. Oracle of Delphi was said to be the naval of the earth. Above the Oracle was a theatre and an Olympic field where track and field events were held from 500BC and I’m pretty sure my 100 metre sprint would ... read more

Getting into the the groove of blogging here. Let's try and finish Greece and the rest of Europe, seeing that we've been in hot and sunny South America now for a month. Let's see, where were we? Ah, Leaving Nafpaktos on January 2nd, we were going back to Athens for a couple more nights before M&M left us to return to the States. Before returning to Athens we absolutely had to visit the historic ruins at Delphi. Southbound on a beautiful day, the morning drive along the coast was spectacular. The only problem for Holden was that his sunglasses had been lost somewhere around Meteora and the strong glare of the sun was overwhelming in shotgun - can't see all the beauty with one's eyes closed. After a while we turned inland and drove through the ... read more