Day 14: Geia sas from Greece!

After a long day of almost 12 hours of travel between plane and bus, we arrived in Delphi, Greece. We were all more than ready for a good night’s sleep. We woke up for a Greek continental breakfast at the hotel. If we’re being honest, I’m not completely sure what I ate, but it was delicious! My favorite part had to be squeezing my own orange juice.

After a nice breakfast we checked out of the hotel and headed down the street to see the only correct model of the ancient sanctuary in Delphi. Our translator, Nikki, gave us a great overview of what exactly the sanctuary was and how it worked, so that we knew what to expect before we went and checked out the ruins ourselves. We learned that the god of this sanctuary in Delphi was Apollo, who was the king of many things, such as the sun, archery, music, and poetry. This sanctuary was one of only two Panhellenic sanctuaries, meaning that people were accepted here from all over Greece. The other sanctuary of this kind is Olympia, where we are headed next. One of the main things that sets this sanctuary apart from others is that it had an oracle. The oracle is a person that would answer any questions you brought him, ranging from political questions, questions of war, sickness, or love. The oracle would find the answers to these questions in a dark, forbidden room in the back of the temple. The model of the sanctuary showed us the outer wall, and the main temple of worship at the center. Just inside the outer wall, and all the way up to the center were small treasuries, where people could bring and store valuables from their homes. In the back of the sanctuary, there was a large theater built into the mountainside used for theater, music, and poetry. Not included in the model, was a large stadium even further up the mountain where the athletic competitions would take place. Now time for the real thing.

At the base of the mountain, we saw a couple things. First, was a building that used to house a fountain filled with sacred water that people would use to drink, and cleanse themselves before entering the sacred area. Today, that same sacred water still flows, just outside of those ruins in a small stream. We all had a taste, then turned around to see the ruins of an old gymnasium. It was a long skinny building that athletes and military used to use to train for wrestling and running. We then headed up to the sanctuary.

The treasury of Athena has been reconstructed to see what it would have looked like long ago.

We got to see the ancient ruins of the temple of Apollo.

We saw what remains of the theater and stadium as well.

It was at the top of the stadium that Nikki shared how the ruins were discovered. The ancient city had been buried over time from war and weather. The new city of Delphi was built directly on top of Apollo’s ancient city, until the French discovered it in the 19^th century. They decided to quite literally pick the city of Delphi up and move it, in order to excavate the entire site.

Professor Kim shared a cool little piece of history with us on the way out that you would never know was there unless someone told you. Near the entrance to the sanctuary, there was a small rock with the modern symbol of the Olympic rings carved into it. As we’ve learned, this logo wasn’t designed until many, many years after this sanctuary was excavated, which leads to the question of why it was there. She shared that this was actually propaganda from the 1936 Berlin Olympics that were held during Nazi Germany’s reign. The Germans traveled to Delphi, as well as other ancient Greek ruins, and planted these rocks with the modern logo, and pretended to excavate them, to show that their Aryan race was linked to ancient Greece. This of course was not true.

We then headed inside to the museum where we saw many of the things excavated from this site, including a sphinx that used to guard it, gold and ivory statues, as well as many other statues, and one of the oldest written down musical melodies.

Before hitting the road, we stopped for some traditional Greek food for lunch. This consisted of Greek salad, and meat platters containing chicken, beef, and lamb. It was all very delicious, and we all enjoyed trying yet another traditional meal in a new country.

After lunch, we began our travel to Olympia, stopping about half way in a small town on the coast called Nofpaktos, where we walked around, skipped some rocks on the beach, and had a light snack.

We then continued our journey to Olympia, where we checked into our hotel upon arrival, relaxed for a minute, then headed to the main street and found some dinner to wrap up the day.