I stayed three nights in Gjirokaster. We took a day trip to Butrint, and we spent a few hours in Berat yesterday on our way to Tirana, where we are now. Gjirokaster, Butrint, and Berat are all UNESCO World Heritage Sites. I’ll mostly let the photos do the talking, and I’ll share some of what UNESCO…
One of the things I like about traveling with OAT is what they call “A Day in the Life.” They give us an opportunity to interact with a local family in a way that gives us a chance to understand what life is like in their community. Yesterday we spent the morning with Roland on…
I expected my travels to Greece to consist primarily of seeing ancient ruins and experiencing Greek culture. I didn’t expect so much scenic beauty. And then we came to Ζαγόρι (Zagori) and I was blown away for the third time in the past four days, but this time because the landscape is stunning. Some of…
I don’t know how to write about Meteora. Most places I’ve traveled in my life I’ve researched in advance. But I knew nothing about Meteora before I came here. So I was blown away by the amazing rock formations. And then I came to realize that they are topped by medieval monasteries that would be…
Some of these stories are true. Some are mythological. I think they’re all interesting, and they all help understand a lot about Thessaloniki and the nearby places I visited over the last few days.
This morning I left Crete and flew to Thessaloniki, where we are spending three nights. Our last two days were spent traveling from Chania to Ηράκλειο (Heraklion) and visiting the Palace of Minos at Κνωσσός (Knossos). I’m finding more and more that photos tell my stories better than I do, so I’ll be brief here…
Χανιά is Chania, the city where I spent the last two nights. I just admire Greek for having one letter for sounds that the Latin alphabet requires two letters to spell. Χ (chi) represent the “ch” sound in German “Ach” or Scottish “loch.” Θ (theta) gives Greek its “th” sound with just one letter. It’s…
I had just about a day and a half in Athens. I arrived Sunday afternoon and left before dawn on Tuesday morning. It was a whirlwind visit. That’s okay. There was not really all that much to see. Athens is a one-trick pony. It’s a pretty damn good trick, but having seen it, I don’t…
I’m back at the airport awaiting my flight to Athens. (I’m not going to finish this until later, though.) My time in Rome has come to an end. I’ve had a lot of time to do a lot of things, and still didn’t manage to do everything I would have liked. In the past I’ve blogged…
Yesterday morning I took a tour of Rome’s Jewish ghetto. I wanted to write about it while it’s still fresh in my mind, but the day got away from me yesterday. Today I have nothing scheduled until late this afternoon, so I’m going to use the time to catch up on rest and on writing.…
There are four Romes. I’ll elaborate in a minute. I started out writing a detailed blow-by-blow account of my first full day in Rome. Sleep overtook me, though, and now I have two full days under my belt. So instead of describing my activities hour by hour, step by step, church by church, sight by sight,…
I made it to Rome! After a long journey (I left the house on Monday evening at 6:30 and I arrived at my Airbnb at 3:30 this afternoon), I am finally here! But more aptly put, I am finally here after many fabulous trips to many other places, including two prior visits to Italy. So here’s a…
