Meteora

Monastery of Varlaam After spending Wednesday night at The Monastery of St Dionysisus of Olympus in the foothills around Mt Olympus we headed south to visit an area called Meteora, home to six monasteries set on the tops of huge rock formations overlooking a river valley.  The weather was mixed with some clear skies but also occasional clouds.  As we approached the Meteora area low clouds and light rain moved in.  Unfortunately it made visibility quite limited.  However, we were definitely not disappointed.  After driving up a winding narrow road the Monastery of the Great Meteora emerged from the clouds just above us.  Established at the end of the 14th century this monastery was only accessible by rope ladder or a basket and pulley system until the early 1900s when steps were carved into
View Looking Norththe rocks.

We crossed a wooden bridge and entered via a narrow tunnel cut into the rock which connected to a well engineered stone stair case.  After an 8 story climb we were at the gate.  In the 1970s a massive restoration effort by the Greek government was undertaken to save the deteriorating monasteries.  Many structures were restored and now are in excellent condition yet they preserve the look and feel of the original structures.  The monastery church is made entirely of a unique looking porous stone that took twenty years to get all the blocks to the top ( hauled by rope and pulley) and complete the church.  Our guide tells us that the porous nature of the material has helped preserve the church and its treasures over the centuries.  We have seen many churches over the last two weeks and this was among the most beautiful, the frescoes were stunning. Cleaned twenty years ago they show vibrant color and detail.  All of the ancient monastery churches we have seen in our travels have soot darkened interiors which makes it impossible to determine the original color and detail.

The view from the Great Meteora was spectacular.  Again, it was too bad that the weather didn’t cooperate.  Much of our time there was in cloud cover, although it did tend to make the place all the more surreal.  I did snap a few nice shots as you can see.  I’ll have more in the gallery when I return home. 

Looking Into The Church We left the Great Meteora and drove a mile to the Monastery of St. Stephen, a women’s monastery.  At St. Stephen’s you drive to the top and must walk down slightly to the monastery.  It too has been restored and has several lovely gardens.  The main church is smaller than the one at Great Meteora and was never frescoed when it was built.  After 14 years of work one iconographer has it about two thirds complete.  The iconography is amazing.  Good iconography is not simply beautiful as art but is has a spiritual dimension that transcends the artwork. Orthodox iconography has a very proscribe form and structure that differs greatly from western art forms.

During our visit to the bookstore the nun, Mother Paraschive, who was working the checkout engaged us in friendly conversation.  We have discovered during our visit that Greeks are really fascinated by American Orthodox.  As Greeks seem to be inclined to do with many things; they think of Orthodoxy as “theirs” and are proud that we Americans would adopt their religion.  Since we are traveling around with a highly visible
View From St Stephen’s Orthodox priest, Fr Peter, it is obvious we are Orthodox.  Just the other day while dining in a small café and young Greek man came over to our table as he was leaving to talk with us and congratulate us.  Mother Paraschive was fascinated in the same way.  When we got ready to leave she insisted we stay and took us to the questhouse where we had Greek coffee ( it is growing on me!) and a light snack.  There we met another nun who was also curious about us.  It was very cute.

Before we left they took us to a small stone chapel where they hold most of the winter services.  Although it was dark inside we immediately noticed how all of the main icons on the iconostasis were damaged with most of the faces destroyed.  Mother Paraschive told us that during the Greek Civil, just after WWII, communist rebels seized the monastery and lived there for many months.  While there they defiled the icons.  The wall frescoes where all but destroyed.  The ones that remained had bullet holes in the faces.  We have seen evidence and read of many other similar tales in our travels.  This kind of thing was common during the Turkish occupation when many churches were either destroyed or turned into mosques.