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GREECE 2006 - Weeks 7~8 |
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It was a remarkable feeling standing amid the dwellings of a
civilised society from 7,000 years ago. Alongside the earlier Neolithic
settlement, a Mycenaean city had developed around 1,300 BC, most likely
ancient Iolkos from where Jason and the Argonauts had sailed in search
of the Golden Fleece (a quest we regularly make ourselves, as all our friends
will know!).
Threading through the Tembe Pass, where the towering cliffs of Ossa and Olympos mountain ranges meet, the highway leads down to the coastal plain of southern Macedonia. This dull coastline offers a series of soulless campsites, and Camping Olympos Zeus, marginally less unattractive than others, provided a base for 2 thrilling days in the Mount Olympos area. In the evenings, the Skops Owls 'bleeped' noisily around the campsite.
Continuing
northwards, we diverted west on the new Egnatia Odos highway to
the town of Veria, to visit another Macedonian site, the royal tombs at
Vergina. Originally excavated in the 1970s by Prof Manolis Andronicos of
Thessaloniki University, the site proved to be the Macedonian capital
Another long week of challenging ventures and fascinating human encounters - the very essence of our travelling life-style. Follow us eastwards next week to Halkidiki and onwards towards Thrace Sheila and Paul Published: Wednesday 17 May 2006
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The motorway
north across Thessaly is today much improved thanks to generous EU
subsidies, enabling us to make good progress towards the city of Volos
and the Pilion peninsula which curves
around to embrace the Pagasitikos Gulf. But in passing, we threaded
around hills of olive and almond groves to visit 2 extraordinary sites -
the Neolithic settlements of Sesklo and Dimini. These hilltop settlements
had been occupied from 7th to 4th millennia BC by Neolithic farmers, and
the stone foundations of their houses showed a well-organised community.
The decorated pottery remains revealed levels of ceramic technology
producing high
quality wares some 2,000 years before wheel-turned pottery.
criss-crossed by a
network of cobbled paths called kalderimi, still used as functional
routes connecting village houses scattered across the steep hillsides.
Unlike other areas of Greece, the Pilion hills are richly endowed with
springs; the kalderimi are lined with irrigation channels and everywhere
there was the sound of freely flowing water. We spent an exhausting day
following the kalderimi (Photo 1) up from the coast high into the
hills to the classic Pilion mountain village of Vyzitsa. After a
gruelling uphill walk in hot sun through olive groves, we savoured a
cold beer at the village plateia (square) under the welcome shade of the
enormous plane trees (Photo 2). It was a superb day's walking the
kalderimi, drinking fresh mountain water and enjoying Pilion's rich and
varied wild flora (see right).
While
here, we had also to experience another of Pilion's delights, the
legendary narrow gauge railway which winds up through the hills from Ano
Lechonia to the mountain village of Milies. This masterpiece of
engineering, built
originally in 1903, gains height via sweeping contouring curves, crossing
heads of gullies on stone-arched viaducts, and the ride along the
narrow-shelving route high above the olive groves is thrilling. The
route's climax comes just before Milies when the track curves into the
apex of a sharp bend across the head of a horrendously deep gorge
spanned by a flimsy girder trestle-bridge (Photo 3). At
Milies station, a memorial marks yet another German 1943 atrocity when
26 men from the village were executed and the village burnt; how many
more such war-crimes shall we encounter? If you visit Milies, good value
local cuisine is to be had at the Taverna Panorama just out of the
village (ignore the 'mousaka-and-chips' tourist traps); try the kouneli
kokkinisto (rabbit stewed in tomato) - it's delicious.
Our
northward journey across the uncharacteristically flat fertile
Thessalian plain by-passed the dreary garrison town of Larissa. The
horizon to the north is broken by the distant misty outlines of
Mount Ossa and
the lower slopes of Mount Olympos. The expression 'Piling Pilion on
Ossa', meaning an enormous but futile task, derives from the mythical
war between Gods and Giants, when in a desperate attempt to reach the
Gods' home on Olympos, the Giants picked up Pilion and set it on Ossa. We
faced similar trials, contending with Greek driving standards. We turned
off to the mountain village of Ambelakia in the Ossa foothills. In the
late 18th century, this community had developed the first industrial
cooperative producing dyed woollen textiles for export all over Europe.
The enterprise generated an enlightened prosperity for Ambelakia at a
time when Greece stagnated under Turkish oppression. A few of the
village's mansions survive, including that of the cooperative's last
president; the charming Ottoman Rococo decorated interior demonstrates
the community's former affluence. And here we enjoyed yet another
memorable 'people encounter': the museum curator proudly showed us his
text books for learning English, and was delighted to respond with help
to expand our Greek vocabulary. 
To reach
the 10,000 feet summit of Mount Olympos is a serious 2 day
mountaineering venture, overnighting at one of the refuges high on the
mountain, and up to end-May snow still covers the higher reaches.
Despite this, we
did want at least to sample Greece's highest mountain, which seems to
rise sheer
from the coastal plain. It was a startling sight, seeing the huge massif
of the snow-capped mountain projecting above the cloud layers to
unexpected heights. The approach from Litohoro climbed in spectacular
fashion into the heart of the mountain, and the 1:25k Greek Anavasi map
of Olympos gave superb detail for our route which started behind the
clearing at the road's end. The path was well-made, rising steeply
through beautiful beech woods which glowed lime-green in the morning
light. The air was clear and sun filtered down through the dark pines,
giving occasional glimpses of the snow-covered tops. The mountain was
overwhelmingly massive, giving little impression of the route's
surroundings, climbing up a spur or rounding lofty shoulders with
staggeringly deep gorges falling precipitously to the side. The path was
well-engineered, making spectacular height gain with little sense of
exposure, and living up to Olympos' reputation for supporting the finest
wild flora in Greece. As the pines thinned at 1,700 metres (5,500 feet),
a snow-filled gully made further advance uncertain; this seemed a worthy
high-point for a our 1 day climb, and the first time we had stood on
snow in Greece (Photo 4). It had been a
superb day's climb: the flora and woodland were hugely rewarding, and
the immense mountain topography spectacular. No wonder Mount Olympos had
been the legendary home of the Gods.
Next morning
we woke to see the sun sparkling across the Aegean beside our camp, and
today we should visit the
archaeological site of Dion in the Olympos foothills set against the
backdrop of the
snow-capped
Olympian peaks. Dion had from ancient times been a cult-centre of
Olympian Zeus and developed as the sacred city of the Macedonians. The
excavated remains of the city and its sanctuaries showed the political
and religious significance of Dion, which was finally destroyed by
earthquake in the 5th century AD. Its monuments were preserved under
mudslides and are now displayed in the excellent museum. It was a
multi-sense experience visiting Dion: the magnificently panorama of the
Olympos range served as a backdrop to the archaeological remains (Photo
5); birdsong resounded among the trees and storks soared over the
foothills; and the air was scented with lemon balm and water-mint. And
spread out before us was the Altar of Zeus where Alexander the Great
sacrificed in 334 BC and held military reviews before embarking on his
world conquest. Dion was a breathtaking experience.
city
of Aegae, later the royal burial place for Macedonian kings. It was here
that Philip II, father of Alexander the Great, was assassinated and
buried in 336 BC. The main finds are a series of vaulted chamber tombs,
including that of Philip II and other Macedonian royals, all buried
beneath an enormous tumulus. An elaborate underground display area
enables the tombs to be viewed in situ along with the fabulous burial
treasures. These include wonderfully delicate gold-leaf crowns of oak
leaves, and a solid gold larnax which contained the cremated king's bones,
and decorated with the 16 point Macedonian sun-emblem. Also displayed
was the silver funerary urn of Alexander the Great's assassinated young
son, also adorned with crown of gold-leaf oak leaves (Photo 6).
Vergina was a thrilling experience, but the visit had its frustrations:
crowds of ill-disciplined school parties and a total ban on photography.
We had no qualms about 'borrowing' photo 6 from the Greek Culture
Ministry's web-site.
Despite
the horrendous traffic in Greece's second city, Thessaloniki, we
survived the ring-road, but to say
this was just a marginally stressful experience would be a painful
understatement! The closest campsite was some 30 kms south at Epanomi,
and from here we travelled into the city by bus,
changing to a city-bus
at a retail park on the outskirts. This was a satisfyingly challenging
experience, managing routes, tickets and bus-stops; all of this served
further to improve our Greek, and again we were blessed with
extraordinary helpfulness from Geeks whom we met. We spent an
exhaustingly hot afternoon visiting some of Thessaloniki's sights: the
wonderfully atmospheric fish, meat and produce Modiano markets (Photo
7), the
waterfront and grandiose Plateia Aristotelous, and the
basilica of Agios Dimitrios restored after the 1917 destructive city
fire and containing 7th century AD mosaics. Capital of the Roman
province of Macedonia and second only to Constantinople under the
Byzantine Empire, many of Thessaloniki's Roman remains such as the Arch
of Galerius stand side-by-side with modern apartment blocks and trendy
street cafes (Photo 8). The modern city has a prosperous air, but
you don't need to look far to see evidence of a permanent
underclass of poor Anatolian
Greek families, unemployed Albanians and East European refugees. It
formerly had Greece's largest Jewish community, until 1943 of course
when the German invaders deported some 60,000 for immediate gassing in
concentration camps, the worst atrocity committed in the Balkans. And to
compound their barbarity, the Germans desecrated the city's Jewish
cemeteries. Thessaloniki's architecture exemplifies its multi-cultural
past: that afternoon we saw Roman, Byzantine and Ottoman remains amid
the trappings and traffic of a thoroughly modern city. And in true Greek
fashion, we pushed our way onto the bus back to Epanomi by the city's
emblematic White Tower on the waterfront. To get a good feel for
Thessaloniki's atmosphere, visit this web site for some live web-cam
views of the city:
