Our Cradle (Greece)

Member Name: MagdaDH

Product:	Greece
Date:	24/06/09 (54 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: history, landscape, sea, people

Disadvantages: busy and touristy

Greece is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe, if not the world, and there are very good reasons for this.

Blessed with the warm climate of the southern Europe, boasting fascinating and diverse mainland, long coast and hundreds of islands dotted over the eastern Mediterranean, Greece would be a place worth visiting even if all it had was its natural beauty.

But Greece is also a true cradle of European culture - with a wealth of historical monuments and antique archaeological sites that no other country can possibly rival. Its known history spans several millennia, from the Minoan civilisation of Crete to the glory of classical Greece to fascinating if less known periods of Byzantine, Frankish and Ottoman rule.

Thick books have been written about Greece and all its attractions, and you could spend years exploring the amazing variety of all it has to offer.

I visited three times for the total of over six months, and I undoubtedly will go back again: there is so much I have not seen yet!

You won't find many undiscovered gems in Greece - it's been trampled by Grand Tourers and modern tourists, rough-guided and lonely-planeted to exhaustion; and yet it retains its charms and its magic.

I have a mixed attitude to major tourist attractions: yes, they do get rather overrun by tourists, travellers and Americans; yes they are often over-commercialised and over-photographed. But they often became attractions for a reason: and who are we - tourists and travellers as well - to make judgements on who is worthy to share them with us? The best of the places manage to shrug the camera-carrying locust as if they weren't there.

Some things are unmissable - even if they seem like tourist traps: everybody who visits Greece, should at least consider the very best of its highlights. Go in ate spring or autumn. The weather will be better and the locust less thick.

== Athens and Peloponnese ==

The Peloponnese, a large peninsula in in southern Greece (the hand-shape just West of Athens) is one my favourite Greek destinations. It's compact, very easy to get to, easy and quite cheap to travel around by public transport, and it has a wealth of sights and attractions for a visitor.
It's a bit of a Greece in miniature, and offers something for everybody: sights from all significant periods of Greek history, absolutely fantastic landscape and good beaches. If you have a couple of weeks only in Greece, spend 2 or 3 days in Athens and then head for the Peloponnese for 10 days. Visit Delphi on the way back and you will have seen a lot of what Greece has to offer.

(1) Athens.
Historians still argue what was the combination of factors that brought the short flourishing of the classical Greece, which took part about 500 BC, concentrated on the city-state of Athens and whose influence is still present in the European (and European influenced) culture almost two and half millennia afterwards. In Athens, the unmissable highlight is the Acropolis. Each bigger Greek city had its own, but the Athenian one is the queen of them all, with the iconic Parthenon (the classical Doric style temple of Athena Parthenos - the virgin goddess of war and wisdom), the monumental gateway of Propyleae and a host of other remains, now at last with a modern museum displaying the more fragile artefacts. Apart from the Acropolis, the National Museum in Athens is a treasure trove of ancient art, from frescos to sculpture and with a huge collection of classical pottery.

(2) Sunion.
Not too far from Athens, the ruins of the temple of Poseidon at the Cape Sunion at the very tip of the Attica peninsula, looking over the Aegean sea perfectly showcase the mastery with which the Greeks chose locations for their temples. Visit at sunset for the full impact.

(3) Delphi.
In the foothills of the Parnassos massif, on the northern coast of the Gulf of Corinth, about two hours' drive from Athens, lies a site that used to be thought the very centre of the Earth, the Omphalos, or the navel of the world. A scared site devoted to Apollo, and famous for its oracle, the ancient Delphi is a huge site spread over big area, incorporating a museum, temples, shrines, a stadium, amphitheatre and sacred rocks and springs. Despite throngs of tourists its magic is still detectable and if there is one site outside of Athens that any visitor with even slightest interest in ancient remains should visit, it's this one.

(4) Mycenae and Tiryns.
Before the Greece of the classical period came the Greece of Homer, of the exploits of heroes larger than life, Trojan war and the bloody family sagas of the Atrides. Two prime sites with magnificent remains of the Mycenaean castles are located within half an hour's drive of each other in the Argolis, on the Peloponnese peninsula. If only one of them is to be be visited, it should be the grim citadel of Mycenae, towering above the Argolis plain and famed for the golden hoard of prehistoric treasure discovered here by the robber-archaeologist of the 19th century. The museum is excellent, the walls and the layout of the castle still very clear, the hive tombs gloomy and the ghosts of the doomed families of ancient rulers can't be avoided. But if you have time, do pay a visit to nearby Tiryns, a monumental castle on the flat plain, where the walls are even more impressive.

(5) Epidavros.
Not far from the Mycenae is an altogether more cheerful site, often incorporated into coach tours that take in Mycenae and Tiryns, but really worth a good half day on its own. Ancient Epidavros is a vast complex from the classical period, a scared site devoted to the demi-god of health Asclepios, an ancient healing centre in a fragrant pine grove, with temples, dormitories and gymnasiums, but perhaps best known for its huge amphitheatre which sits 14,000 people and an acoustic so good the the pin dropped in the centre of the stage can be heard in the furthest row of seats. The sick came here to pray and be healed and even today it seems to exude a positive, life affirming vibe.

(6) Olympia.
Still on the Peloponnese, but near to its western coast and not too far from the Ionian sea is the third of the must-see Classical sites (after the Acropolis and Delphi), the location of the ancient Games (the name of our modern ones is derived from Olympia). Again, beautifully situated and abundant in well preserved and partially re-constructed ruins, this site will give an excellent insight into the importance of sport in ancient Greece and in the connections between the physical and spiritual that is was strong in the culture of those days.

(7) Mystras
One of the few non-ancient sites on this list, Mystras is a whole, largely ruined (although most churches are fairly intact) ghost city on the mountainside in the interior of the Peoloponnese peninsula, a few miles from Sparta. It was the capital of the Byzantine rulers of Greece in the 12th and 13th century AD and it offers a fascinating insight into the life in those medieval times and into a culture whose influence and importance is often undervalued. The frescos in the churches are outstanding.

(8) Corinth
Corinth is a large and not terribly attractive modern town at the north-eastern tip of the Peloponnese. It's well worth visiting for two main attractions: a wonderful, large complex of ancient (classical, Hellenistic and historical) remains in a nearby village of Archea Korinthos, which gives a good idea of what a whole old city would look like, and the Corinth Canal, cut deeply through the rocks of the isthmus and connecting the Saronic Gulf of the Gulf of Corinth. If you can't get on a boat to travel the length of it, stand on the bridge and look down: breathtaking!

== Meteora ==

Meteora has a distinction of combining a stunning location and a cultural attraction. On the edge of the plain of Thessaly there is a group of natural sandstone pillar-shaped outcrops, impossibly topped with a complexes of Eastern Orthodox monasteries. They started building them in the 14th century, to escape Turkish invaders, and of the original twenty, six still remain (five male and one female). Now functioning primarily as a museum, Meteora is one of those "have to be see to be believed" places and eminently worth visiting.


== The Islands ==

Moving away from the Greek mainland, the Greek islands offer, if possible, even more beautiful landscapes, sea, beaches, and more historical sights of great importance.

(10) Crete
A large island and almost a country to itself, Crete offers wonderful landscapes, interesting mountainous interior with the famous and eminently worth visiting Samaria Gorge, good beaches and remains of the ancient Minoan civilisation. For the serious sight-seers, the Knossos palace is an absolute mus, despite many historians grumbling about the validity of its "creative" reconstructions.

(11) Santorini (Thira)
Many consider this the best of all of Greek islands. A unique topography (the main bay of the island is actually a caldera of a giant volcano, whose explosion was responsible for the destruction of the Minoan civilisation on Crete), breathtaking views, blinding white of the Cycladic architecture and fascinating museum of prehistoric art combined with a excavation site at Akrotiri. This island gets very busy in the high season, but its attractions are so many that it still is an absolute must for visitors.

(12) Delos
One of the most important and one that should not be missed is the small island of Delos, pretty much a museum-island, an ancient location of the cult of the Apollo and the site of the Delos treasury, now a vast site of fascinating ruins. Since ancient times nobody has been allowed to die, or be born on Delos to preserve the purity of the site. The island can be visited by ferry from nearby Mykonos (which, by the way, despite its unquestionable prettiness, is an overrated playground for rich jet-setters and gay men).

(13) Rhodes
Infamous for an excesses of British holidaymakers in Faliraki, Rhodes is a large island near the Turkish coast (part of so-called Dodecanese) and if you keep away from the relatively small areas overrun by visitors on cheap package tours, can offer a lot to a visitor. In particular, it has what's possibly the best castle in the whole of Greece, in the island's capital of the same name.

(14) Hydra
For those who don't have time or inclination to explore Greek islands further out, Hydra offers a great short trip from Athens. As many such spots, very busy in the high summer, but still extremely picturesque, with a lovely harbour surrounded by steep alleyways of the main town (many rich and famous have their holiday homes here). Perfect for a stroll and a meal in a taverna, or walk further out for a great swim from the rocks. There is no motorised transport on Hydra (apart from garbage trucks).

Summary: go