Blogs from Delphi, Central Greece, Greece, Europe - page 6

With the weather in northern Greece not so good today (better tomorrow and for the next 5 days) we decided to stay in Delphi and do some walking. Perched on top of a mountain overlooking Delphi was what seemed to b a viewing hut. It seemed a good idea, and there was a clearly marked trail. It took 3 hours to do the climb, mostly a relatively easy walk, and a bit less than 2 hours to get back down, The views were fantastic. We also saw eagles, a snake, loads of butterflies, flowers, and at times the whole mountain seemed to smell of thyme, sage and oregano. At other times it smelled of dead goat but we only saw one of those. We saw hundreds of crickets. Going to head north tomorrow, find somewhere on ... read more

Well I have to say, that despite the previous day's pessimism regarding certain ruins, I have become a changed man. The ruins were quite impressive and in remarkably good shape. But before Jan gets ahead of himself, I am going to steal the keyboard to tell you guys about the site itself. Delphi is an UNESCO site. It is home to the temple of Apollo and the sanctuary of Athena. There is also a theatre (ampitheatre), stadium, gymnasium, and numerous treasuries. Most of the foundations of the site date back to the Mycenean period, but the ruins that we saw were later constructions that were built on top of those. Most of the remaining site dates back to the 5th/4th centuries (before Christ). We walked up to the modern museum to buy our tickets, but after ... read more

Last night we got two new roommates, a dad and his daughter were hostelling from Greece to Italy and finally to Slovenia. At first it was nice to room with them because the dad had paid for air conditioning for the room, it was heavenly!!! They were in bed early and both had some sort of "problem" during the night. The dad was a cronic snorer and the daughter had a crying fit sometime in the night. It was interesting. BUt we felt less bad when we woke up at 8 this morning and had to get ready and pack while they were still sleeping. We were ready and checked out by 8:30am. Last night we had purchased our bus tickets for the city bus after some wonderful Gyros!!! I have been fantasizing about more ever ... read more

Once again it was difficult to travel back in time to appreciate the site with so many people around, both us and the other tourists. My anticipation was that it would still feel like a holy site but reality was more like a circus with thousands of tourists yacking and walking around with guides speaking in many languages from every 'corner' of the Sanctuary. It is unfortunate that they can't protect the artefacts in situ rather than having the sites sitting naked and the gems of friezes and statues in sterile rooms in the museum as it must have been an incredibly intimidating journey up the Sacred Way, past all the fabulous votives of the 'rich and famous' of the day. An ordinary petitioner must have spent the whole trip up the Sacred Way wondering whether ... read more

Well I would have to say that today was one of the best days yet! This morning we went to all the ancient sites in Delphi... And there are a lot considering it is a very small town. There are two different sites for the ruins... Both different parts of the ancient city. The pictures that I will put up soon will show and explain these sites better. But they included the site of the Delphi oracle, the naval of the world (Zeus let 2 eagles go in opposite directions and wanted to see where they crossed to find the center of the world, and it was in Delphi that they crossed), the Tholos, and many others! So we spent the morning there and then went to the museum, which, again just had a lot of ... read more