Day 10 The Oracle at Delphi

Left Meteoria and took the bus over the Thessaly plane, which stretches as far as the eye can see. Headed south on a 4 hour bus ride .

Crossed some really pretty mountains and olive groves. Many olive groves are picked by hand, but some are machine harvested. The olives are then soaked in a sort of brine & pickled. Some are ground up to make olive oil, which I think Theo told us is a 10:1 Kg ratio. Meaning 100 Kilos will yield 10 kilos of oil or something like that? The town of Amfiisa is renowned for its Olive Oil, which we passed through en route to Delphi. Olive trees as far as the eye can see. Theo told us that these trees can live up to 400 years or so, and many seemed to be regrafted, meaning new shoots added onto old stumps which seemed to prolong the life of the tree. Once the olive tree is planted, it is watched carefully for 6-8 years, after which it can self sustain, as its roots will go very deep to get water. I noticed a lot of ‘drip irrigation’, which is an Israeli invention, but seems to work well for their Olive groves.

Stopped just outside of Delphi for mouth watering lamb and potatoes. 9.50 Euro, and fell off the bone, delicious. Out back, we had a great view and I got some pics which I’ll post below.

Delphi the town is pretty small, and city streets are one way. Though every other shop seems to sell souvenirs, the stuff seems to be virtually the same exact kind of stuff. My guess is that like most other places around the world, they get their distribution for such wares from China. I can't prove that, but it is just a hunch. Of course every now and then you may come up to something hand crafted or home made, but such cottage industries can't hope to keep up with Chung Quo.

Came to the Delphi museum, which I’m told is fairly new. Met our guide who took us up into the ruins of Delphi, which used to be a Temple dedicated to Apollo. The Oracle of Delphi was a woman that spoke in tongues and had to have her predictions translated by a group of male priests. Everyone who was anyone famous in the ancient world came here to get some sort of sign, like Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Socrates, St. Paul, etc.

Our guide was informative, but at one point she took the group up to the lower middle of the ruins, and lectured to us for ½ hr in the hot sun, while she stood under a tree. The kids were really good sports, but we were really kind of ticked that she spent so much time in just one sport of the ruin.

We climbed up the hill and saw lots of cool remnants of the ruins and the theater. Much like Olympia hosted athletic games for Zeus every 4 years; Delphi hosted contests for musicians and actors to perform against each other. Sort of like the place of an ancient ‘star search’ or something like that. All to glorify Apollo and his muses.

Put people up on a stage or in front of an audience and it takes very little for them to be convinced to perform. Here we see Rentar flanked by Madeline and Emily, 2 muses of silliness striking a pose at Delphi.

The base of the temple had massive rocks that fit together like jig-saw pieces. This actually allowed them to grip into each other better, lasting countless centuries of earthquakes and slippage. I saw similar type builds while in Japan, which is also a volcanic area. I suppose stone masons know that this style has much more benefits rather than stacking stones in a brick wall traditional method, which earthquakes can topple easily?

Also, on the base walls of the temple, it was common for the Oracle's predictions to be written down or recorded for posterity, which the entire base is carved in Greek as you can see by the bottom right picture.

There was one stone, which the Greeks thought used to represent the center of the universe. This is now kept in the museum, but a mock example now stands for people to pose with. I will show both.

The Christians tore down the ruins many years later. Meer and I joked that if you believed that your own religion was a solid thing, then why would people be so insecure as to have to tear down such beautiful buildings just to make themselves or their new religion feel better? Anyway, it just seems I have seen much unwarranted destruction from the Christians during this trip; I can’t help but agree with Meer’s statement.

Got back down from the mountain and we had about ½ hr to see the new museum. Mostly everything inside of it came from Delphi, and they did a nice job showing where each item was found etc. This statue is known as the charioteer and is one of the more complete bronze statues ever found in Greece. Apparently, when invading armies such as the Romans or Turks found such statues, they were often melted down or re-cast as something else. This one had been spared somehow.

One really cool feature was at the exit of the museum, they had a model showing what Delphi should have looked like back in the BC times. All that remains visible now are those few remaining columns of the Temple and the Theater.

Delphi hotel was something of a joke, 1970’s style rooms, very Spartan, no bed slips, bathroom the size of a phone booth, and strange wall colors, which Meer of course described as ‘Strip club purple’ in décor. We did have a small balcony that overlooked a neighbor’s rooster which made noise the whole damn time. (the pic on the left was taken off our balcony) Nevermind the 6 flights of steps we had to climb every time we wanted to leave the hotel. This place served us dinner and scrimped on the portions big time. I think I got 3 veal meatballs, and 2 scoops of rice! I think Theo was embarrassed so we filled out a bad eval on this place.

Played Uno with the kids in the coffee shop across from the hotel. There was also internet, but it seemed a bit expensive. I actually tried to stay as unplugged as possible during this trip, knowing I’d blog it all when I got back to the States.

Some other odd or irrelevant observations:

~Passed by an Italian Lamborghini store, which used to make tractors before its great claim to fame of manufacturing sports cars.

~ Nowhere in Greece do we ever see ceiling fans. As hot a place as this is, and as sparing as they tend to use the AC, Meer and I feel that anyone who can load up a truck of ceiling fans could come over to this country and make a mini fortune. Seriously, NO WHERE do we see them, and EVERYWHERE could use them!

~ Like Italy, the Greeks have yet to get the idea of the plastic ‘shower curtain’ which shouldn’t be rocket science, and yet it would seem even the some of the most modern of hotels, they really struggle with this concept.