Boy the bus ride down from Delphi was a nail biter. Picture an extremely windy road with hairpin turns. Got that? Now narrow the road to approx 1 1/2 car widths. Yes they saved $$ on lane striping. Now add the occasional car coming behind or in front of you that wants to pass your tour bus. Oh the bus? Is seats 56 and has 3 axles and 6 tires. Our driver is AMAZING and clearly has nerves of steel. We passed through at least narrow passages with rock walls on each side. He needed a shoe horn. And a couple places with sharp turns in a village (yes there are tiny villages up on this hillside) with a house at the bend it’s a miracle it hasn’t had a bunch of damage. In Greece when someone dies on the road they put little altars up. Or big altars. Kinda like our crosses. We made a joke of watching for altars and were amazed at how few (like maybe 3) we saw on this stretch.
We also passed by huge olive groves on the way. See below.
I digress.
We ended up at a town and took a narrow gauge railway up to another mountain town (Kalavitra). Yes you can drive up there. But the train took us through this amazing series of river gorges very narrow very beautiful. JIM: some serious geology on this stretch. Actually the entire country is full of what to my untrained eye is amazing geology. Hell, even all the ruins are limestone with shells in them!!!
The town at the top is a popular day trip for Greeks on a Sunday it seems. It is also notable for a massacre that occurred in 1943 when the German occupiers (their term) killed all the men and boys down to age 12 in the town in retaliation for the Greek resistance. Yes. All of them. Whole families. There is a very simple but powerful memorial.
We also passed by huge olive groves on the way. See below.
I digress.
We ended up at a town and took a narrow gauge railway up to another mountain town (Kalavitra). Yes you can drive up there. But the train took us through this amazing series of river gorges very narrow very beautiful. JIM: some serious geology on this stretch. Actually the entire country is full of what to my untrained eye is amazing geology. Hell, even all the ruins are limestone with shells in them!!!
The town at the top is a popular day trip for Greeks on a Sunday it seems. It is also notable for a massacre that occurred in 1943 when the German occupiers (their term) killed all the men and boys down to age 12 in the town in retaliation for the Greek resistance. Yes. All of them. Whole families. There is a very simple but powerful memorial.
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