THIS IS SPARTA (actually, Northern Greece)

I'm so behind on blogging!!! The past few weeks have been nonstop, an endless cycle of packing, traveling, overloading poor Yianna on laundry and repeat. But today it suddenly hit me that I have ONE WEEK left here. That's all. No more. So I'm making myself sit down and do this to make future me happy.

So. Way back on March 26 we left on a 4 day expedition to Northern Greece. To be honest, I wasn't as excited for this trip as I was about, say, Egypt. This trip involved traveling through several biblical sites all the way up to Philippi and then making the trek back to Porto Rafti from there the last day (an 8 hour drive) And as much as I love road trips, I just wasn't pumped for sitting forever and doing more museums at first.

March 26 - Delphi

 I changed my mind once we got to Delphi. The view was incredible, and I felt like I was in Montana. (Now, I've never been to Montana but it's what I pictured Montana would look like in my head.)

 

Delphi holds a vast amount of history for the Greeks - it's where the Pythian games were held (I had to give a presentation on this here. It was held every 4 years, but 2 years before and 2 years after the Olympic Games) There's an old stadium and theater there to mark this, as well as a temple of Apollo (the god the games honored). Delphi is also where the Oracle was. The oracle was the priestess at the Temple of Apollo, and one of the most prestigious oracles of the Greeks.

 After the 3 hour drive to Delphi we stayed there about 2 hours, looking at the site and the museum there. We ate lunch (chicken skewers, rice, fries, bread - this became a common theme in what we were fed for the next 4 days) then hit the road for a couple more hours to get to Meteora. Check this place out.

It's like ROCKS. But ridiculously cool rock where Monks live. Meteora means "middle of the sky" where six monasteries were built. We went straight to our hotel though, and waited to explore til the next day.

March 27 - Meteora, Berea, Thessaloniki 

Sunrise the next morning. Wow.

We went up to a monastary the next morning and it was amazing. The view, the church, the very fact that they built it up in the rocks and used to use ropes to pull each other up.
 

Bruce McLarty, the guy who's going to be our new President at Harding next semester, came on this trip with us to make a video of all the biblical places we went, too, so I decided to snap a pic with him for kicks and giggles. 

Afterwards lunch and then on the road again to Berea (which is now known as Veria). Paul preached here (read Acts 17) and Dr. McLarty gave a lecture to be videoed for future Paul classes. Then Thessaloniki, where we went into a church and looked around. It was evening by that point then so afterwards we just went to the hotel to eat dinner.

 March 28 - Thessaloniki and Philippi

The next day we went through more of Thessaloniki and then drove to Phillipi! We went to the site where they think Paul was imprisoned, but our very wise guide James informed us this couldn't be it because they wouldn't put a prison by the center of the city where everyone was (we were literally right downhill from the theater, and they wouldn't do that)

Next we went to the site where Lydia was supposedly baptized. There is a little church there that's absolutely beautiful. Our group sang in there, like we always do when we visit places, and it was wonderful. I could have sat there and sung forever and ever. I think that's been one of the biggest blessings of this trip - the opportunity to live with these fantastic people, to laugh with them, to bond with them, but to grow spiritually and worship our heavenly Father together.

  March 29 - Dion and Thermopylae

We began our drive back, breaking the 8 hours up into a couple groups. We drove 3 hours and stopped in Dion, near Mt. Olympus. It's where an important sanctuary to Zeus used to be. We toured the site for an hour, then the museum for another hour, then lunch for another hour. Back on the bus and we were on our way to Thermopylae.




Thermopylae, for all you history buffs who care, is the site where the Spartans fought the invading Persians, or more likely known as where Gerard Butler fought in 300. It was pretty cool. They say if you're lucky you can still find arrowheads around the area.

The battlefield

So there's my very brief record of our Northern Greece excursion. I may come back and add more but with finals this week I have a few other things to finish (Yes contrary to popular belief I do have school and homework over here haha)

I have another trip to tell everyone about also! Our CRUISE! We just got back a few days ago and I had the most amazing time. But we'll save those stories for that blog.

Ta ta for now,
Rachel