Walked where Paul did. No big deal.

We're baaaaack! From where you may ask? The Peloponnese. The southern part of Greece that consists of a large peninsula and is the site of many important historical events and mythological stories. This raw country is so so breathtaking I have no words for it. I might even dare to say that it's more beautiful than the mainland of Greece. As we drove into the Peloponnese over the Corinth canal we all just stared in amazement, green mountains on one side and the ocean on the other. I've never seen anything like it and I have no pictures to do it justice. >Heads up, this post is going to be pretty long. I've got a lot to say whether you want to read it or not ;)

The Corinth Canal (You can bungee jump off of this!!!)

Wednesday January 23, 2013 - Day 1

First stop: Corinth.

Paul spent 18 months in Corinth on his second missionary journey where he stayed with Aquila and Priscilla and worked as a tent maker while speaking in the synagogue.We were able to walk through the agora, or marketplace, where Paul once walked and preached to the Corinthians (to read the full story go to Acts 18 - I read it on the bus after and kept thinking I've been there. I've been there now!)

Our guide, Constantinos, talking in the Corinth ruins. This guy's hilarious.

CORINTH!!!

Walking up to the agora.

 Before we walked in the agora though, we went through the museum and the temples, looking at all the statues and reading the history of the Corinthians. And wow. It really hit me staring at all the tributes these people made to gods how desperately broken they were. These people devoted their lives to worshiping these gods. Not just money and time and sacrifices, their lives. How lost they must've been. How much they lived in darkness despite all their wealth and knowledge for their time. Thousands of these people lost together, praying to gods that weren't real, gods that could never answer their prayers, gods that could never save them. It's just so sad. As overjoyed as I was to be in the beautiful ancient city, I just couldn't wrap my mind around this Greek world's mythology. Sure, I've studied it, read stories, watched movies for entertainment. But this was their life. It was real for them. It breaks my heart. But I know why Paul was there, was his purpose was. What a light he must have been.

The temple of Apollo by the agora.

Cheesy ground picture, but this is the ground Paul walked on. Yes.

The agora ruins.

 The 2nd stop of the day: the Acrocorinth. "Acro" means upper, fitting because this was the acropolis of ancient Corinth. The view was incredible.The whole city, the ocean, the mountains, everything was beneath us. Normally we follow Constantinos around with our whisper sets on (headsets to listen to him) but here we were given time to run around and explore, a part we all enjoyed.

View from the castle.

Just chillin on a castle. You know.

The Corinth town below.

Showing that Grecian spirit at the top!

3rd stop: Cenchrea. An old important port on the coast.This is where Paul stopped to cut his hair (also on his 2nd missionary journey) to fulfill a vow (Acts 18:18)

The old port of Cenchrea.

4th and final stop of the day: The cutest little village called Tolo where our hotel was. Our room was  RIGHT next to the water and we had the most spectacular sunrise in the morning.

GOD IS AMAZING

Friends leaning out of our hotel room. Right on the water. WOWZA

The precious sleepy town of Tolo. It is their off season right now so not many people were there.

And that was day one :)

Thursday January 24, 2013 - Day 2

First stop: Epidaurus. A small town in the Peloponnese famous for its theatre and healing center, Epidaurus held many wonders for our group.

Apparently people would come here and pay to spend the night in the enkoimeteria, a big sleeping hall. In their dreams Apollo's son Asclepius would tell them how to cure themselves. 

At the bottom of the theatre you could here a coin drop. Fantastic.

2nd stop: Nafplio. A seaport town that I am madly in love with. Firstly, there was a castle there with a to die for view. Secondly, the town is out of a fairytale. We walked the streets after lunch and I couldn't believe it was real life.

3rd stop: Mycenae. Okay, history nerd that I am, I was super excited about this. Mycenae is the old site of Agamemnon's palace. (Troy anyone?) We walked through the ruins and Constantinos told us that even after Agamemnon died he would still reside there, watching everything. He said, "Turn to your right and look." And BAM.

Do you see it?

Okay, closer look. His outline is in the mountains! You can see his face, nose beard, chest. (I know it's dark, it was about to rain)

I just ate that up. So cool.

Entrance to his castle.

The burial site.

Afterwards Constantinos showed us an old honeycomb shaped temple lower down. It echoed beautifully, and someone had the idea to have the group sing in it. We sang three 4-part songs, "All Praises Be", "Magnificat", and my favorite, "The Greatest Command". Wow. Wow wow wow. Our group of about 40 blended so well. It was just one of those moments you want to hold on to and stretch out, relive again and again. I'll never forget that. Constantinos humored us even though it was raining outside and wanted to move us along faster to the museum. (and everyone know Greeks don't like the rain!)
After the museum we hopped on our bus again and headed to our hotel in OLYMPIA!

Friday January 25, 2013 - Day 3

Okay, first off let me say that our hotel, a best western called Hotel Europa was way cool. It was a five star and super duper nice in that chill cabin kind of way. I tried rabbit for the first time. Tasted kind of like chicken. Anyways.

1st stop: OLYMPIA

We toured the site for a couple hours, learning about the history of the games. It started in 776 BC. Fun fact. They used to run with loincloths but one guy's fell off and it was considered good luck, and welp, they all ran naked after that. Weirdly enough, we were there a long time and learned more there than anywhere else but I don't have much to say about it. Probably because I mostly remember it starting to pour and us trying to all cram ourselves into the museum to get out of it with a bunch of Japanese tourists chattering at each other. It was cool though, I ran on the stadium where they used to race.

Ready to race!

SO. That was my journey Peloponnese. Sorry it's super long! Didn't want to forget anything.

The places we visited starting with Corinth and ending in Porto Rafti back at the Artemis