Saturday, June 26--The Peloponnese

The Peloponnese is the name given to the lower portion of the country; it's still called an isthmus, but is separated entirely by a canal which was completed in 1893, although efforts to that end date back to 700 BC. Nero had plans drawn up and construction started in 67 AD and some say those were the plans that were actually used. Other accounts suggest that the plans for the Panama-Suez canal provided the model. It is less than 4 miles long, and before the canal was built, ships were sometimes pulled over land on a rock road built for that purpose, or cargo was off-loaded from one side and put on wheeled carts to be carried to ships on the other side. Today it is spanned by two major bridges, both of which we crossed.



We drove along the east coast of Corinth and  then into Argos perfecture where our first stop was Epidaurus.Scenery is gorgeous with views of the sea and groves of olives, though usually not the orderly kind of orchards we're used to seeing, rather just scattered about the hillsides. The most famous and best preserved all the ancient theatres in Greece is here. Built in 3rd C. BC, it can seat 12, 000 and is still used for performances, having nearly perfect acoustics.

Some ruins of the temple built to honor Asklepios, the god of healing, are also here in Epidaurus, and we visited a small museum at the site.

Then we headed west across the middle of the Peloponnese and stopped at Nafplio--obviously not a Greek name--which is capital of the prefecture and home to three old fortresses: the Venetian fortress of Palamidi (late 17th C.)crowning a hill in the middle of town, and reached by a flight of nearly 1,000 steps, which we did not climb--
the Acronofplia (14th C--
and the Bourtzi (15th C) which is an island in the bay-- There are some great pictures of the town here; we didn't actually get to tour Naplio since we just had a 10 minute rest stop.
On to Mycenae for lunch and to visit the ruins at the acropolis, which is entered through the Lion Gate--there used to be carved stone lion heads facing toward anyone who approached. This is the ancient home of a tribe that ruled much of Greece for several hundred years, up 1100 BC. Like all good fortifications, the acropolis offered a commanding view to the surrounding area, even to the sea in the east.
We then drove to the Treasury of Atreus, a beehive shaped tomb, aka as tholos tombs, which was the most common form of burial architecture from about 1600-1100 BC.

As you can see, we covered a lot of ground in one day. We finally arrived on the west side of the Peloponnese in Olympia.We weren't really near the town at our hotel, so most of us just had dinner and rested up, while a few of the group headed to the bar to watch the World Cup matches. The chain of  hotels where we stayed (Amalia, pronounced Ahm-ah-LEE-ah after the former queen), were on a grand scale, a couple decades past their glory days, and almost empty except for our group of 18.