SEGMENT 4

Leaving the spiritual place of the Meteora Monasteries behind, we pointed our Jeep eastward. Following some winding minor country roads through rolling hills, we passed several dilapidated farmhouses. Every once in a while, we were fiercely attacked by watchful sheepdogs who came so close to the moving vehicle that we were afraid to run them over. Soon the road turned into gravel, albeit still in good shape. We kept following our map and the general direction of east until reaching an intersection where the trail split into two, both arms running almost parallel straight ahead of us (pic 01). Which was our turn-off? We decided to stick closer to the river.
The sides of the road were lined with gigantic thistles and vegetation got thicker. Turning around a bend, we discovered two turtles, one animatedly in pursuit of the other, obviously inspired by the spring air…. After watching them for a while, we continued on until suddenly, we were on pavement again. Soon after, we stopped to ask a local farmer for a direct route to our next destination: the excavation site of Dion. He pointed in a direction and explained in rushing Greek, and we followed what we had understood as "continue along this unpaved trail, at each fork stay straight." It started to rain, and all of a sudden we found ourselves in lush, rainforest-like vegetation, crossing several smaller creeks and puddles. The trail split up continuously, and it wasn't always easy to define "straight" but we enjoyed this small adventure tremendously. (pic 02) Just as sudden as this wilderness had enclosed on us, we passed out of it again and reached a tiny village together with a major thunderstorm accompanied by a downpour so intense that we had to stop. We decided that this was a good time for a coffee break and were warmly received at the local bar where the owner made room for us on the only dry table on the patio to serve us the best "café ellinikó" we had tasted so far. When the sun was out again, we continued to the ancient site of Dion (pic 03) at the foot of Mount Olympus.
Dion was once an important site to honor Zeus. Its first mention in historical records is of 424 BC! Alexander the Great celebrated his victories here. The excavation site is huge and includes an entire city, several temples, an amphitheatre and several supporting structures. Interestingly, although it was first identified as an important archeological site in the early 19th century, formal exploration didn't start until the 1940ies. As the site was long covered by a swamp, it was very well preserved.
We spent several hours walking through the impressive display. Some of the marble floors were well preserved (pic 04) and we could imagine how people lived and celebrated here. It was mindboggling to move around in this area with remains of structures way more than 2,000 years old!
Tired out from much history, walking and post-thunderstorm mugginess, we pulled up on a long sandy beach for the night. We had reached the east coast! We drove through the soft sand to a private little spot and nobody disturbed us for the evening or the following day as we relaxed and walked on this beautiful beach. (pic 05) The only visitors were several bright blue jellyfish, which, as we did not know their exact level of toxicity, spoiled our bathing pleasure. Time to move further south. We were ready for some serious beach and ocean fun!

pic 01

pic 02

pic 03

pic 04

pic 05


for more pics click here