March 12 - Meteora - Sunset tour

We were up at 5:30 this morning in order to be at the train station for 7. After a 4-hour train ride with what we thought was great scenery we arrived in Kalabaka. This is the village or town just below all these rock formations. We quickly deposited our baggage and went for a walk taking pictures of what we thought again was amazing scenery.  We had not seen anything yet.


Our driver picked us up again at 3:00 for the sunset tour. I don't know how to explain what we saw except that it was jaw dropping. I have never seen anything like this before. The tall peaks of rock formations with hardly anything growing on it and monasteries perched on top or built into the rockface. It is hard to imagine how someone would want to live here. The biggest monastery “The great Meteoro” was started in the 11th century.


To get there and bring the materials to build these monasteries that were built so long ago. They dug little holes in the rock face with chisels and then built ladders that they could pull back up so no one could climb up. They had pulleys to pull up the materials. They lived mostly on nuts and fruits.

Monastery located at the top right.

Close-up view

We visited a monastery that was a nunnery. The feeling of peace and tranquility is indescribable. Once inside you don't notice that you are perched over a cliff. They have many small buildings and big ones scattered among the walkways and little gardens with places to sit and contemplate or pray while looking at this beautiful view. The woman needed to put a skirt over their pants and have long sleeves in order to enter. They provided the skirts.

Selection of skirts to choose from

Rollande modeling her new outfit

Odette doing the same

Out of 24 monasteries there are only 6 left with monks, 2 of which are nunneries. The monks have dwindled down to just a few per monastery. The primary reason being that they prefer other monasteries with lesser distractions.  All the tourists are a distraction to the way of life that they chose to live.

Kalambaka and the caves in the background

Rollande has arrived

Hermit caves

Monastery in the Clift.

Caves at the bottom of the cliffs formally used by farmers to store food and keep animals 

St. George Madilas (Saint George with the Scarves)

Painting high up in the cliff.

At the end of the tour the driver dropped us off at a restaurant that 
he recommended. We had our first authentic moussaka which didn't taste anything like what we'd had back in Canada. Of course, this was washed down with some good barreled wine served in what looked like a little copper pot.

Small garden on the edge of the rock

Pully system to bring supplies to the monastery

Entrance to the monastery

Jacques waiting for a photo opportunity

Jacques taking a picture of Rollande taking a picture of Jacques

Rollande doing the opposite

Nearing sunset

 A part of the series Game of Thrones was made with the rock formations of Meteora as a basis and a lot of computer work.

The before picture

The end result