Greece - part one

---

After spending so long in Egypt and getting aclimatised to the heat and constant sun, Greece has been a bit of a shock for both Ben and I. We have just finished a four day bus tour up into the Greek mountains, seeing some spectacular scenery, but also having to scramble to find shops selling umbrellas and frantically searching through suitcases to find trousers!

I'll start from the beginning...

We arrived in Athens at silly o'clock in the morning, after no sleep, so needless to say, we spent most of the day just relaxing, and getting organised. But later in the afternoon we headed out for a walk and found the Temple of Olympian Zeus, and Hadrian's Arch, the old entrance to the city of Athens. Our hotel also had lovely night time views of the Acropolis, so we werent too worried about coming home early and sitting up there just watching...

The next morning began with the Acropolis which even in spite of all of the scaffolding and "restoration" going on (to be read, "placing bright white pieces of marble over the older marble, leaving a very odd contrast on the facade...") it was spectacular. Once you get up there, there is no doubt why they built such an imposing set of buildings up there-the views are amazing, all across Athens, right to the sea. We walked all around, through the amphitheatres and caves along the "sacred way" that winds its way around the acropolis.

We then decided to be adventurous and head to another one of the high mountains (really it is called "Lykavittos Hill", but it was large enough to be a mountain!) and climb to the top to see what those views were like, aqnd to see the little Agios Georgios church... hmm, half way up, it didnt seem as good an idea as at the bottom! Luckily there was a cable car to take us up the steepest final bit, otherwise it would have been a long long walk! But the views were well worth the effort!

Those were our two days in Athens, as the next morning we started our bus tour of mainland Greece. After having a 6 person tour through all of Egypt, it was a bit different on a 60 person bus tour, but there were plenty of fun people and a couple of other young people, so it was quite a lot of fun.

We headed out to the Pelopennese island, through the Corinth Canal, and drove through Kalamata watching the huge expanse of olive groves stretch out before us. We also saw the Theatre of Epidavros, where the acoustics of the amphitheatre are so good that from the "cheap seats" way up the back (and yes, we climbed all the way up there) you can hear a pice of paper being torn on the stage. Really, we cheat quite a bit with microphones these days! We then continued on to see the Tomb of Agamemnon, which was where the rain definitely set in, but just added to the drama of the area with the mountains, clouds and rain.

The first night was spend in Olympia, where we spent the next day seeing the birthplace of the Olympic games, including where the Olympic flame is still lit today before the relay across the world.

More driving that afternoon (including across the Corinth Bridge that is one of the industrial wonders of the world - Jan we got a few photos for you, but they didnt really let us stop at the best place for pictures), until we reached Delphi, which was definitely my favourite town that we stayed at. It is quite a tiny town, perched precariously on a steep cliff, with amazing views on to the second largest olive grove in Greece (only about 20 million trees...).

Delphi is the site of the oracle of Delphi, where people would come to ask questions of the gods, to be answered via a priestess. The site is still spectacular, despite being in ruins. One building has been restored to give a small idea of how everything might have looked years ago. There are a number of stories, debating whether or not there is any substance behind the goings on at Delphi, such as the smoke rising out of the rocks, spirits inhabiting the area etc, but long before the Temple of Apollo and Delphi were set up, there were even more ancient peoples that made the long trek up into the mountains to that particular spot, so there is definitely something very special about the area.

After absorbing as much as we could in Delphi, including drinking from the fresh water springs - apparently after that I am due to get married in the coming year... hmmm, lets wait and see shall we 😊 we headed further north to Meteora.

I hadnt really heard anything about Meteora except that there were some monasteries up there. Oh my goodness, are there some monasteries up there!! The area derives its name from meteorite, as the enormous rock formations look like they are fallen meteors and while Im not sure that I agree with that, perched on these enormous rocks are some amazing monasteries. The first inhabitants of the area were hermits that came up to hide away from the world, and then came the monks and nuns. We were told that for some of the monasteries, before they could be built, it could have taken up to fifty years to be able to get the building materials across to the outer limits of the rick/cliff face where they wished to build the monasteries. And not only did they build in these difficult places, the decorations inside the churches were absolutely beautiful. Very small, and peaceful (apart from all of the tourists).

The more I am travelling and seeing, the more I think that we really arent going to be leaving as impressive or lasting monuments behind us as all of these people who came before us, sad really... but the Burj Dubai (the worlds tallest building) really doesnt have anything on most of the monuments through Egypt and Greece.

So the bus tour finished yesterday, and we are now in Santorini... having a lovely relax and enjoying the change of pace. We flew in at modday today, and spent a couple of hours walking around the town, and along the "Caldera" or rim of the volcano (Santorini is the flooded crater of a volcano). It is amazingly pretty. Tomorrow we have booked a day cruise around the centre of the volcano, where we can climb the centre, and swim in the hot springs, before sailing to the furthest point of the island and watching the sunset... it will be very hard to take, Im quite sure!

---

Photos

Temple of Olympian Zeus
Including the column that fell in an earthquake

Delphi
The view from breakfast

The temple of Apollo at Delphi
Where the oracle used to reside

Monastery on an isloted rock
Apparently there was a scene in the Bond film "For your eyes only" shot here...? I havent seen it personally, but will be finding when I get home. The monastery is on the left rock and can only be reached by climbing all the way down, across and then all the way up again-there is no bridge.

Comments

[jan]

Corinth bridge
Did someone mention to you about my fascination about this engineering feat!! Definitely amazing!! Great to hear of all your travels, best wishes, love jan