After a good night’s sleep, we strolled along to the breakfast room and were able to have breakfast outside. It was very nice with thick Greek yoghurt and fruit, very light cake and some cooked breakfast as well. That all set us up well for the day and it was great sitting out amongst those views.
I asked the proprietor to advise us about local buses and he offered to give us a lift. We decided to go to Corinth old town as the old and new town were in different directions. He took us directly to the entrance for the Temple of Apollo and ruins of the old city, which were a convenient mile and a half away.
Meanwhile back in Preveza, Marco and Theresa had the boat lifted out of the water after their five- month voyage!
The visit to old Corinth was very reasonably priced at €8, which included entrance to the archaeological museum. This housed a really impressive array of artefacts, many of which were incredibly well preserved given their age. Everything was beautifully displayed and there was a very good variety of things to see.
Amongst the highlights were intricate, mosaics, beautiful statues, many household objects, tiny models used as offerings and various amphorae depicting scenes of life at the time and detailed geometric designs (even though some of these dated from several hundred years BC)
The photos here are a statue of Nike, which is impressive in the way the drape of the fabric has been sculpted. ( from The Forum, Roman period) The side view shows slits which were where the wings would have been attached to the statue. Nike was the winged goddess of victory and was worshipped by athletes who wanted to win. The modern day Nike brand symbol reflects the shape of Nike’s wing.
The other pictures of mosaics are part of what was initially a floor measuring 5 x 9 m from a luxurious Roman house dating from 200 to 300 AD which was found 700m from the Corinthian forum. What is special about these particular mosaics is that they use not only stone but glass and therefore there was a wider range of colours involved.
We then spent some time outside walking around the various ruins, which included the iconic Temple of Apollo (550 BC), a forum, a fountain, further temples and a famous road with shops along it to name but a few. There were several tour groups around and as we progressed on the tour two separate groups started singing and conducting religious ceremonies. Clearly we did not photograph any of this ( I took a couple of sneaky pics…shhhh), but it gave a very beautiful and atmospheric feel to the visit.
For those interested in ecclesiastical history, Corinth is significant in that Paul, the apostle, lived there for a year and a half and Corinth is mentioned many times in the new Testament in connection with his mission there.
Once we had finished the tour, we exited into a very touristy street with gift shops and restaurants. We were also very pleased to see a supermarket as we planned to buy a few snacks and stay at the hotel that evening. We chose a restaurant which was good value with good reviews and both chose a Greek style lunch. I had a moussaka and Dave had stuffed cabbage leaves. We asked for a doggy bag as the portions were enormous, and we supplemented it with a pot of Hummus, some local olives, a tomato and some beer from the local supermarket for a room-based dinner later.
We found a taxi rank without too much difficulty. There was one empty taxi on it, and we waited For a minute or two until the driver emerged from a local restaurant. When we got back we had a siesta and then went for a swim. Dave then did a bit of work on one of his websites and a video, while I wrote this blog. Dinner was the picnic that we’d bought earlier in the supermarket, washed down with some beer.
