Our sole day trip outside Thessaloniki was to Meteora, a place remarkable for its unique combination of geology and history.  By Monday morning, with the addition of Y.’s cousin from Romania, our small group had grown to include six friends. A tour bus conveyed us through the verdant hills of Macedonia into the even more rugged countryside of Thessaly. 

       Meteora was almost 240 kilometers from Thessaloniki, three hours’ drive on mainly mountain roads.  Along the way we were awed to behold Mount Olympus, its array of peaks wreathed in brilliantly white clouds. It was easy to imagine Olympus as the home of the Greek gods.  Since the summit frequently is obscured by clouds and mist, we may have been favored by those gods on that fair morning.  My good fortune, however, did not extend to my snapping a picture of Olympus from the moving bus.

       Meteora is an area of sandstone cliffs eroded into flat-topped pinnacles.  Its caves attracted Byzantine hermits serious about living in isolation.  They began settling there beginning in 1,000 CE.  In the 15th Century, 20 monasteries were constructed on seemingly inaccessible rock formations. Everything required had to be raised by rope.  Our guide told us that it took 20 years to gather the materials, and then 20 days to build a monastery, according to local tradition.

       Six of Meteora’s 20 monasteries remain  in use.  On each day of the week, different ones are open to the public, never more than two on any day.

       HL and I had read about Meteora before coming to Greece.  The  guidebook’s description had intrigued me, though I could not have predicted how truly amazing the Meteora complex would be.

We climbed 200 steps to Saint Varlam’s monastery, and a mere 150 steps to the nunnery of Saint Barbara Roussanou.

       Ours was not the only tour bus to disgorge its polyglot gaggle of tourists.  The stairways and the monasteries’ chambers
were crowded, given the size constraints of the ecclesiastical enterprise.  Even so, I learned that many visitors to Greece miss going to Meteora. I realize that there is a plethora of attractions competing for travelers’ attention, but Meteora definitely is worth the trip.