Day 209 Sat 12 May 2007 Delphi to Meteora, Greece

We manage to make it to the archaeological sites this morning before its overrun by tour groups, starting with the temple of Athena before consulting the oracle at the temple of Apollo, progressing up the sacred way past the remains of the various treasuries where the offerings to the oracle were stored. In order to have your prophecy or problem solved you had to pay a fee and make a special offering. Initially the oracle, a elderly peasant woman, who went into a trance after imbibing the fumes emanating from the sacred spring and delivered an incomprehensible rambling which only the priests could translate, gave prophecies once a year, but later as demand grew she was persuaded to ramble each month, except in winter when Apollo vacated the temple and Dyonesis took over. The prophecies were deliberately ambiguous and vague but great store was set by them including momentous events such as waging war, embarking on voyages and founding cities as well as more prosaic such as weddings. The remains although extensive aren’t as much restored as Ephesus and Troy in Turkey, but nevertheless are still very impressive.

Then it’s back on the road, to Meteora 300km north. We quickly discover that the AA Road Atlas of Europe 2007 edition, isn’t as comprehensive as it purports and in fact is about as useless as the ancient Greek map in the museum for finding the way along white roads in the mountains. We find ourselves on roads not travelled since the Spartans took a short cut on the way to Marathon and after several hours emerge back on a main road about 20km from where we started. So we decide to stick to the motorway henceforth although even that has us heading at right angles to our intended direction. However its fast despite the radar traps and we head back up through Larisa, eventually reaching Meteora, where we find the Sydney Hotel run by an Australian Greek who also has fish shops at North Ryde. He promises us a real aussie breakfast which turns out to be no different from any other Greek breakfast which is generally a poor imitation of a Turkish one albeit with the addition of a slice of processed ham.

As the sun is setting we drive up through the narrow valleys between the amazing granite pinnacles, perched on the top of which are various monasteries which we will visit tomorrow.