Greece 16 - Sparta/Sparti/what would Leonidas think of Spartan men today

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For Glenn this was going to be one of the highlights of this trip to Greece. He has read extensively about the Spartans and wanted to see "where it all happened". Our campsite being midway between Mystras and modern Sparti meant it only took a short while to drive to the new town. A non descript place with the streets set out in a grid system. Shops lined the main street. Trees planted up the middle. Dreadful parking. The Greeks park far worse than the Italians. Double parking. Cars left with the doors open. Their wheels pointing into the street. It was a nightmare trying to find what we were looking for. Greeks don't understand roundabouts. Some drivers treat them correctly waiting for traffic from the left to pass before joining the roundabout. Others fly through with priority given to the person joining the roundabout rather than the one on it. It is a game of chicken working out which way the driver in front or on the roundabout will react. Sparti is insipid. There is no other word for it. You would not come here unless you knew about King Leonidas and his Spartan warriors.

We knew what we were looking for. It has been harder to find things with Sally Sat Nag but we had looked on Google Earth before the trip and found the statue of Leonidas near to the Archaelogical Park . There was parking in front of the new stadium and alongside the monument. Up the side of the stadium was more parking and all were within easy walking distance of what was left of ancient Sparta. The area looked rough. Not the sort of neighbourhood you would want to live in. Nor the sort of place you feel easy leaving your vehicle parked up. It looked the poor end of town.

Looking at the town it is hard to imagine what it must have been like in its heyday. Bins were overflowing in part and lads were hanging about on bikes. Sparta was one of the most powerful of the greek city states. How far the mighty have fallen. The Spartans left few remains as they did not need fortifications to keep them safe. They were feared as warriors and this reputation meant that they built no walls to protect themselves or powerful castles.

Our first stop was the statue which was very similar to the one at Thermopolae. It was good to see Leonidas honoured. He looked mighty and heroic. The statue was clean and well cared for.

We walked up the dirty track at the side of the stadium and entered the park. Free to enter it seemed the sort of place the inhabitants of Sparti came to when they wanted to go for a walk or a bike ride. Overgrown and unloved was the way I saw it. A circle of stones marked something important but there was little to explain what that circle was for. A lone lady sat on the stones and had set out her wares for sale. Jewellery she had made herself. I wonder how many items she sold up there in a day. I doubt many came calling.

You have to use your imagination here. Thistles grow everywhere. Pretty little things, purple with an Elizabethan style ruff around their heads. Chickory pale blue in contrast. Blue scabious covered in butterflies. I wonder what Leonidas would have made of modern Sparti men. Probably thrown them over the nearest cliff as they would not have made good warrior material. There was an old Acropolis in one corner - mainly piles of stones with no conceivable pattern. An immense theatre most of the stones robbed out by the folks building nearby Mystras. A fragment of the Roman Temple of Athen Hakiakon and a bit of a ruin of a Byzantine church. Sparti was an aristocratic city state and that was the main reason it fell into decline. There really was little left here from what was such a powerful state. Glenn enjoyed walking on the ground that the Spartans walked on, learned to fight on, where the sons were blooded for war.

What was nice to see was the following morning two lines of schoolchildren walking down the street with their teacher . Holding the Greek flag up high they were off to hoist it in a public place.

Highlights so far : The oranges and lemons on the trees. Pulling them off and squeezing fresh orange and lemon juice into a glass. All the flowers from the roses to the thistles . Greece is awash with them in April and May. Ouzo and souvlaki. Beef stifado. Seeing a tortoise and a rhinocerous horned beetle . The friendliness of the people and the welcome they offer us nearly everywhere we go. The weather which couldnt be such a marked contrast from back home. The views always changing and always interesting. The history and the culture .

And we still have another week before we are due back at Igoumenitsa for our journey back to Italy and onwards to home .

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