Delphi

Alright, so now that i've atoned for my sin of forgetting about Thessaloniki, here's my opinon/rant about Delphi.

Delphi was amazing. Hands down. No questions asked. If you even have a small chance to go, go. It's not only a breathtaking site, as it's perched on the side of a valley about 1,000 feet in the air, the ruins are equally impressive. There's so much history here that i could go on for hours, but i'll keep it brief.

So, other than the fact that the site closed insanely earlier than it was supposed to (2:45 when it was supposed to be open till 5:00...Greece....), we spent the first afternoon admiring the lower site from up high. The lower site was mainly comprised of the gymnasium for practicing athletic events, and there was a temple to Athena lower down on the site. I went and saw this the next day, and it was pretty cool. Worth the half hour of meandering around that i did. We also looked at the Kastalian Spring, the holy spring that those who wished to see the oracle bathed themselves in before going into to see her. Sadly, it's been blocked off and now runs down modern pipes, but part of it was exposed so i got to use the water to wash myself a bit. Pretty cool if you ask me (but i'm just a big dork).

Afterwards, a few friends and i decided to climb to the top of a hill (a couple hundred feet or so) to watch the sunset. This was pretty fantastic. Yes it was cold, and we decided in our brilliance to leave the path and climb straight up through the middle of a briar patch, but it was still pretty cool. I at least enjoyed it. The climb down was a little treacherous as we waited a bit too long so we were climbing down in darkness, but the stars were REALLY clear and it was very worth it. I recommend sticking to the path though ;-). We could also see Mt. Parnassus, one of Greece's more famous mountains, behind us. The sunset was pretty amazing to watch as well.

The next day, we did the upper site of Delphi and the museum. So...amazingly...cool!!! There were ruins from the Greeks, the Romans, and the Byzantines, pretty impressive. My favorite (little bit of sarcasm) ancient author, Pausanias, provides a brief description of the path up the Sacred Way to reach the temple. In in, he tells us of all the large and impressive statues, dedications, and treasuries that city states from around the Ancient Greek world had dedicated. I can't even begin to imagine what it must have looked like. On the way up, you can see a reconstruction of the Treasury of the Athenians. Pretty cool, but def. lacking in what it would have looked like in ages past.

The highlight was next, the Temple of Apollo. Here is where the famous Pythian Apollo priestess who was an oracle, would deliver the oracles. There's not a lot left of the temple, but it's foundation is impressive. It was a large terrace that had to be extended to allow for the temple to be constructed. It's believed that the Oracle would wait inside in the middle and deliver the answers to questions from either individuals or city states. What's interesting about her is this. She was most likely high and competely out of her mind. Scholars/scientists have discovered that there is a fault line running underneat the temple which released noxious fumes which can make a person in an enclosed space have an out of body experience. Crazy, huh? So, what's likely is that the oracle would say something completely crazy and the priests would "interpret" what she said into an answer (predetermined, of course) and give that to the person who asked the question. Or, she might have NOT been high, and the answer would be given to her in advance to tell. If you read some of the oracles we have, they are SO vague that they can fit almost any circumstance. My favorite is this one.

Before the Persian Wars, the Persian Empire was trying to seize Greek city states along Asia Minor (modern day Turkey). One of the kingdoms in the area, Lydia, had a famous king named Croesus. He was fabulously wealthy and tried to oppose the Persians. He was trying to decide whether or not to attack the Persians, so he sent a messanger to the Oracle at Delphi. The response he got was "If you go to war, a great nation will fall." Croesus figured that this great nation would be Persia, so he launched his attack and was soundly defeated by the Persians. Having been captured, he asked permission to send another messanger, and this messanger told the oracle that she was wrong. Her response was that he had misinterpreted the oracle. This just shows how vague and funny some of the oracles are.

There's a lot more about the oracle, but i'll just stop there. The 2 other major buildings at the site were the theater and the stadium. The theater was large and impressive, providing a great view of the area and it also was well preserved. The stadium unfortunetly you were not allowed to go into due to the "chance" of a "mudslide." Pah. in any case, it's a fair hike up the hill (takes about 10 minutes) but it's definetly worth it. You get a realllllly nice view, and then the stadium is also not half bad.

We then got on the bus, drove to a town called Arachova, which is famous for its wool (sadly it was low season so not much was open) and then straight home to Athens. All in all, combined with Olympia, this was a spectacular trip!!