Monasteries of Meteora




St Barbara Monastery in Distance
The Greek Orthodox church is a more traditional form of church to the Roman Catholic church and uses the Greek language as its form of communication, whereas the RC church used latin and eventually in the 60’s converted to the language of the country. Practices are the differentiation between the churches, not beliefs. My apologies to the Greek Orthodox church if I have over-simplified the comparison. It is due to a matter of space in this blog.



Interestingly there is a tablet there called the King of Glory that indicates the number of  philosophers of the early 8th century BC including Homer, Socrates, Aristotle and Pythagoras that all forecast the birth of a God made man (Christ) and even by pure and virgin mother (Mary) 800 years before it actually happened.
Click on Image to enlarge to read
The most stunning part of the monasteries is not their existence but their location and the work to construct them. The rock formations of the Kalampaka area of northern Greece has steep to columns that jut out like Devils Tower in Wyoming. Kalampaka is a new town which was totally wiped out by the Nazi's during WWII due to resistance to occupation.
View from our Balcony Holy Trinity Monastery on Left most column
 Access to them was by rope, where people and supplies were hauled up in crates. 
View down to Town
This area is located approximately 6 hours from Athens and you have to take a dedicated bus tour to see them, or like many Greeks you visit them on Sundays. It is beautiful to see their expression of faith as we were there on a Sunday.














Welcome to Holy Trinity Monastery
There are 6 such monasteries there with the Holy Trinity Monastery being the one featured in the James Bond movie “For your Eyes Only”. St Stephens is the oldest and Mega Meteora being the largest. The term Meteora in Greek is roughly translated to “suspended in air”. By the photos you can see why.


We had a lot of WOW moments as we  hiked up to two of them and then drove with helmet cam active to the 4 others.
Varlaaam

Monastery Valley
Sandra in Cloister outfit to be allowed entry


Enter at the bottom right in the hole, then up the stairs and to the left


Comments

Orestis said…
Welcome to Greece Smiths!
June 20, 2011 at 10:21 AM
The Smith's V Strom Adventures said…
Orestis,
Why didn't you tell us the food was so good here. We are amazed at the originality, quality, friendliness.
Whoooo.... hooooooooo!

How are you not 500 lbs?
June 20, 2011 at 11:19 AM
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