Delphi

At the ancient Greek oracle of Delphi.

The temple to Apollo is behind me.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

Travel Tip: If you ever visit Athens and climb Mars' Hill where the Apostle Paul spoke to the citizens of Athens, make sure you have shoes with good traction. The worn down marble stone that you must climb is extremely slippery.

Today most of our group took a day trip via tour bus to the ancient Greek city of Delphi (pronounced dell-fee). Here is where the famous Greek oracles resided. People from all over Greece would travel by boat to come here and ask one of the oracles questions to help them in life. Although the ancient Greek alphabet is still used today, during the time of Delphi the language did not use any spaces like we do today. So your reply would be one long string of Greek characters. This lead to many possible answers to the person asking the Oracle for guidance.

Besides the location of the Oracle, which is at the bottom of the hill at Delphi, you can also see an ancient treasury, the temple to Apollo, a theater, and at the top of the mountain, a stadium where races took place. Looking at this ancient stadium reminded me of the Mayan ball courts in southern Mexico. One wonders if the Mayan ball courts were patterned after the Greek stadium found at Delphi.

After returning to Athens, we were able to spend some time browsing through the multitude of shops.