Because of our late arrival at our hostel in central Athens (and not making it to bed until after 1am), we let ourselves sleep in a bit and then got up the following morning to head to Delphi. The oracle of Apollo at Delphi is something I had repeatedly read about in history and then in Latin class in high school, and I was eager to make my very own pilgrimage up to the mountains in Greece to see it. During our morning in Athens, we 1) discovered that breakfast "to go" is not a thing in Greece, and also that breakfast before 12 noon is also not a thing, 2) found that my sister Leigh had been right, and Athens is a filthy concrete jungle in which I did not want to spend much time, 3) solicited help from several different Greek citizens to find the KTEL bus station in Athens, which was tucked in on a back street in Athens several blocks up from our hostel, and along the way found that the Greek city bus drivers are friendly but pretty indifferent about whether or not you pay your fares. (No wonder the economy is in crisis.) We made it to the bus station and were told that the bus to Delphi that day was likely sold out, but that we could check at the actual bus to see if we could get a spot onboard. No matter -- we lined up, turned on our inner aggressive/overenthusiastic American selves, and hustled on the bus as soon as we could to save ourselves a seat. (Others had paid in advance, but we hadn't figured out how to do this, and in fact just paid on board.) There was a bit of confusion about where everyone would sit on the bus, and a fair deal of stalling and dallying past the time the bus was scheduled to leave (that Greek time thing again), all of which involved lots of chattering and shouting in Greek. ("It's all Greek to me." Actually.) But, finally, we were on our way, and quickly discovered that the scenery outside of Athens opened up and became quite lovely.
The bus ride to Delphi took around three hours, including some hair-raising moments in which our bus driver navigated through narrow mountain town streets, but finally the ruins came into view on our right and we disembarked in the small town of Delphi, which is really just one or two streets of shops and restaurants near the ruins. We grabbed lunch in Delphi after getting off the bus, ran into some overly friendly American tourists along the way (one of those incidents of running into fellow Americans abroad), and finally made it to the entrance of the ruins by around 3pm. And the travel luck continued -- as the fates of Delphi would have it, that Friday was International Monuments Day and entrance to the ruins and the museum was free! Who knew?
We spent about two hours out at the ruins, first walking up the hill to the Sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi. The ancient Greeks believed that Delphi was the center of the universe, following a legend in which Zeus, the king of the gods, sent out a pair of eagles to fly through all the heavens and the earth and find the spot where the heart of the universe converged. They flew and flew, and finally rounded back and flew head-on into each other at one place: Delphi. (There is a mythical rock at the original spot of Delphi that was supposed to commemorate this event.) And, walking through Delphi and its scenery and its temples, I could believe how an ancient civilization could have believed that this was the center of the universe. The place would have been remarkable for its panoramic views alone: with the Mediterranean sea off to the southwest, it consisted of a valley that quickly rose up to rugged mountaintops alternately dotted with stone cliffs and trees and wildflowers. The sky on the day we visited was a clear blue with some swirls of clouds, and the colors of the flowers lit the entire place aglow.
But, on top of that view, there were the ruins themselves. The ancient Greeks built a massive temple for Apollo on this site, and turned the entire location into an expanded sanctuary, dedicated to the god. Greek islands and cities and tributaries of the Greek civilization would all bring offerings of gold, sculpture, art, jewelry, and precious metals to Apollo, and kept them in a series of "treasury" buildings, all of which sequence up the hill to the main temple. They established statues of gods and heroes and mortals along the pathway and the squares of Delphi, and built spires and brought bronze cauldrons for votive offerings. Farther up the hill of the sanctuary, a massive amphitheater provided a space for plays and rituals and performances and drama. Then, for the Pythian games (sports contests that were held every few years in honor of Apollo), the ancients built a large narrow stadium at the very top of the hill, with seats for spectators and judges and markers at each end for running contests. The Romans later supplemented this stadium, public stadiums and amphitheaters being very much a Roman thing, and the current structure has more of a Roman than an ancient Greek feel. All of these structures are now in ruins, of course, and artifacts were mainly displayed in the archaeological museum at Delphi, which we visited later in the day. Some of the original buildings have been reconstructed.
We walked up to the very top of this sanctuary in the mountainside, marveling at the view and the spirit of the place. It was something that I find difficult to put into words, but a feeling very similar to the one I got when visiting the Forum at Rome in late 2012 with my family. After looking down the hill from the top of the sanctuary, we walked down to the main road, then past the ruined plain that used to house a gymnasium, and to the succession of temples built at the base of the Delphi complex. These compose the sanctuary of Athena at Delphi, and are also in ruins, down to their bases, with one exception -- the famous Tholos, a reconstructed sequence of three pillars that first stood in a circular building whose function is still unknown. This location is the most iconic image of Delphi, and I wish we had been able to stay longer and look at it and ponder. As it was, however, we only had an hour to view the museum before it closed, and had a bus ride back to Athens afterward. So we took whatever time we could in the sanctuary of Athena, then jogged back past the sanctuary of Apollo to the museum.
There, the number of archaeological objects that have been unearthed from Delphi is astounding. Offerings, statues, friezes, temple carvings, jewelry, gold carvings, the remains of massive sculptures: the time and effort and materials the ancient Greeks put into their offerings to Apollo was incredibly diverse and beautiful. (Not to mention imagining the effort of transporting all these materials to Delphi from far-flung Greek islands!) We made the most of the time we had there, then walked back into town and grabbed dinner and boarded the bus back to Athens.
After two and a half hours on the bus, we were nearly back at the bus station when our bus came to a standstill in the middle of one of Athens's streets. We looked out the window to see what was up, and just then I remembered again that it was Good Friday. For the occasion, probably hundreds or even thousands of Greek citizens had turned out in the streets of Athens, holding a candlelight procession and singing hymns and bearing a large wooden cross. It was moving to watch, and I wished I could have joined in a similar procession that night. We soon got off the bus at the station after they passed by, and saw a few other groups out on the streets on our way back to our hostel. No time to waste, though. We slept well on our last night together in Athens, before we visited its main event -- the Acropolis -- the next day.
Emily and I had decided to meet up with our Oxford friends Rachel and Joe on Saturday, since they (along with Joe's family) had been traveling through the Mediterranean and were also winding up in Athens. It worked out well, since I would be traveling to the island of Corfu with them on Sunday, while Emily would head back to the UK. The two of us wanted to see the National Archaeological Museum in Athens before meeting the larger group, though, so we got up early on Saturday morning, packed up our stuff, and walked a few blocks to the museum from our hostel. It was well worth visiting, with a broad collection of Greek artifacts from the prehistoric/Minoan period through the classical and late eras to the Roman period. Too many statues and vases to count or recall! I could have spent hours there, but we marched ourselves through, then left and picked up our stuff and took the metro to central Athens, where we met Rachel and Joe and company at their hotel. They were staying right next to the Acropolis, so we set out to see that archaeological wonder straight away.
I'd seen photos of the Acropolis from several friends who had been there (and from Leigh, of course), but visiting the place itself was beyond incredible. Being up on a rocky, craggy hill above the rest of Athens, its white marble seems to soar into the sky, and there is a certain experience of walking up the steps from the base of the hill and seeing the columns rise up overhead and feeling overwhelmed by the impact and the feeling of being there. We took many photos and tried to soak in the entire place and its history and its legend in western civilization.
There was the Temple of Athena Nike, on the edge of the hill of the Acropolis.
And then, of course, there was the Parthenon.
I feel insufficient to describe the Acropolis here, since it has been done so many times already. What new thoughts of any substance do I have to add? The entire hilltop was strewn with fragments of marble bases, columns, and pillars, and the Parthenon was under restoration. The place was swarming with tourists, and I'm sure is even worse in summertime. The top of this ancient citadel gave the impression of being blindingly, dazzlingly white. It was a whiteness that had endured thousands of years, a gleaming beacon of ancient civilization.
I am beginning to wax poetic here. How can you not, when it is the Acropolis?
I am going to let these photos be sufficient for the moment. We finished at the Acropolis within around two hours, then walked back down the hill and found lunch at a cafe nearby. Afterwards, we were going to go to the Acropolis Museum, which opened in 2009 among much fanfare, but it was Holy Saturday and the museum was sadly closing early. That's one of my regrets from visiting Athens, that I didn't get to see the artifacts inside the museum, but I will be back. Instead of going to the museum, then, Emily and I walked through the ancient agora, a hillside complex at the base of the Acropolis with many ruins of temples, shrines, public squares, theaters, and other buildings of significance in the ancient world. We took some time to reflect on the day and the trip, grabbed Greek frozen yogurt on the way back to the hotel (finally!), and then bid each other goodbye as she left to head back to Oxford.
That left me with my other two friends (and their accompanying family members), and we had a nice dinner near the hotel, chatting and catching up about spring break travels, before bedtime. Corfu awaited for us the next morning! One part of the Greek adventure was ending, another part beginning. More on that soon.
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