September 30, 2019. Trip Oversight
“I was happy in the midst of dangers and inconveniences.”
-Daniel Boone
Top 12 Trip Picks
• Pyramids of Giza
• Parthenon – Athens, Greece
• Meteora, Greece (Kalabaka)
• Plitvice Lakes National Park, Croatia
• West Cork, Ireland
• Banks of the Seine, Paris, France
• London along the Thames
• Luxor, Egypt
• Dublin, Ireland
• Peloponnese, Greece
• Dubrovnik/Trogir/Zadar, Croatia
• Cappadocia, Turkey
Lesson Learned: Winter in Greece is about like winter in Charleston, South Carolina. At least in Athens and to the south (except in the mountains). In February they call it Spring….the oranges and lemons are being harvested. This is amazing to me considering how much further north Greece is compared to the US. Athens is at a latitude of 37 degrees north, which is approximately the same as St. Louis, MO. A typical day is lows of 10 (50) and a high of 17 (63). In the Central Greece mountains, they do get snow, as they do in the northern part of the country, and we missed a road-blocking snow by about a week, but its not like being in Missouri, by any means.
We were caught in a snow shower as we departed Delphi and I had visions of a treacherous mountain pass, but it never happened. They have tunnels all throughout Greece, so the mountain descent was rather gentle as the highway has eliminated most of the hairpin switchbacks for the more direct route through the mountain. The snow soon turned to rain, and then to sunny skies as we headed west towards Corfu and the coast. Did I mention that the Greek highways are absolutely fabulous? There are tolls everywhere you go, which gets a little pricey, but they are well worth it.
You may all go to Hell, and I will go to Texas
Everywhere I can
Seven months on the road and countless sites seen, cities lived in, countries visited, and cultures experienced leave you with countless memories, opinions, thrills, new friendships, and real-life exposure to images and places we’ve dreamed about our entire lives and twice as many more that we’d never heard of before we departed the U.S. It also leaves you with a yearning to see more.
But we’ve also got a list of the things we’ve seen or places we have really enjoyed. We are continually asked what we enjoyed the most or what we liked the best, and that’s tough to describe, or rank from 1 to 100. Our trip experience was cumulative, and difficult to separate the experience into discrete events. Much of what we did or saw built upon the events of the previous day or week, and blended over our travels to paint our memories. Here are a few of our favorite memories from our travels in 2019. You’ve heard of these places before, but here’s a list of experiences we’d do again. Today, Meteora.
Meteora, Greece (Kalabaka)
The drive from Delphi to Kalabaka isn’t bad. The tedious mountain passes with crazy Greek drivers passing on blind corners never appeared. The 3 ½ hour drive zipped by, and we were in Kalabaka by 1. Kalabaka is not a pretty town. The streets are kind of crazy and crowded. Its very much a working community, until you get to the old city center (which allows cars) and there you’ll find some nice cafés, a few fountains, and lots of bars. There are plenty of hotels, so decide if you want to stay in the burbs, or in the middle of town. I think that’s a matter of personal preference, and availability of parking if you drive.
Cathedrals in the Sky
I’m happy we came to Meteora in the low season (even if one of the monasteries was closed for the month). Let me rephrase that, DON’T come to Meteora in the high season. It will be like Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras, without the Hurricanes from Pat O’Brian’s. Just looking at the bus parking lots (which were mostly empty) I can see how massive the crowds are in the summers. Everyone, come see this stuff, it defies description and photos don’t do it justice.
Amazing is what we’ll call this place! Meteora, besides being a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is something to behold. It really opened our eyes to the lengths ancient man would go to promote and worship his deity. I’m an ER nurse, we dwell in the land of cynics, hysterics, drama, and exaggeration of the facts (usually by the patients, but I know a few nurses that wear this description as well). In short, we’ve seen it all, or at least we think we have. This place is jaw-dropping amazing, and that is no exageration.
So, here’s the story (according to Wikipedia, paraphrased liberally by me). Meteora is a rock formation in central Greece hosting one of the largest and most ridiculously built complexes of Eastern Orthodox monasteries. The six (of an original twenty four) monasteries are built on immense natural pillars and hill-like rounded boulders that dominate the local area. It is located near the town of Kalambaka at the northwestern edge of the Plain of Thessaly near the Pineios river and Pindus Mountains. Meteora is included on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The name means “lofty”, “elevated”, and is etymologically related to meteor (I normally use verbiage like that, I simply don’t know what it means).
Here are the monasteries we visited in the order we came to them by road:
• Monastery of St. Nicholas Anapausas
• Monastery of Rousanou (Nunnery)
• Monastery of Varlaam
• Great Meteoron Monastery
• Monastery of the Holy Trinity
• Monastery of St. Stephen
More down to earth….. the caves in Kalambaka have been inhabited continuously between 50,000 and 5,000 years ago. It’s a great place to hide or hang out if you are into cave living or need to avoid wolves or Ottomans or bandits or aluminum window salesmen. So, along comes a bunch of ascetic-type hermit monks who, in the 9th century AD, moved up to the ancient penthouse caves. They lived as high up on the rocks as 1800 ft (550m) above the plain. Initially, the hermits led a life of solitude, meeting only on Sundays and special days to worship and pray in a chapel built at the foot of a rock known as Dhoupiani. But, all good things must pass. These rocks became high-rent for monks and a housing crisis arose.
As early as the 11th century, groups of monks began to occupy the caverns of Meteora. However, due to monk migration, monasteries were begun to be built in the 12th century, when the monks sought somewhere to hide in the face of an increasing number of Turkish attacks on Greece and found that low-rent condos on the valley floor came with extremely high deductibles for Pillage Insurance.
The exact date of the establishment of the monasteries is unknown. By the late 11th and early 12th centuries, basic condo associations began to form which encouraged home improvement and bee keeping, mainly because the Ottoman muslims thought these crackpot priests were not worth the trouble.
Ellen and I had a blast here. I can’t overstate how impressive these monasteries are, and how dedicated these monks were to accomplish such amazing fetes of architecture and construction. I’ve always wanted to see them since the James Bond movie “For Your Eyes Only” and only when I witnessed them in person did I realize how under exposed they were in the movie. They are Simply Marvelous structures (said with a Ricardo Montauban accent).
Where to stay: Hotel Theatro Odysseon. Nice, clean, renovated, with theme rooms. We picked a deluxe room (Zorba the Greek) and spent the night with Anthony Quin while he danced on the beach. Great bed (thank you) huge balcony with a view of the town and one of the monasteries and only a short walk to café’s down the street. We really enjoyed this place for two nights. It was more expensive than we normally spend (75 Euros a night) but that did include a fabulous breakfast. The best thing is its an easy trek to the monasteries in the morning.
How long should you stay: Two nights and a day and a half. You can stay longer if you want to really explore the cliffs. We were there when some of the monasteries were closed, so our itinerary was a bit truncated. The town of Kalabaka, though pleasant, has nothing else to anchor you in this locale for any longer than three days.
What to see: Uh, the monasteries, maybe.
Next Up: Plitvice Lakes National Park, Croatia