It's now time for part II of my trip through Italy and Greece. From Rome I flew off to Thessaloniki, which is the second largest city in Greece after Athens and is in the northern part of the country. Personally, I think Thessaloniki is much prettier and more inviting than Athens--it's right on the Aegean Sea and has a lot of really nice museums and ancient ruins. My friend and I stayed with relatives while there so we got to have a real local experience, which is definitely my favorite way to travel--being a tourist without feeling like a tourist. My relatives cooked us amazing Greek food (and fed us non-stop, not that I'm complaining) and took us to all the interesting stuff in the city.
We had a lot of really awesome experiences in Thessaloniki. I loved just sitting and drinking cappuccino freddo (Greek iced coffee) with views of the sea (which we did at least once a day--major caffeine addiction after this trip). Then there was the Archaeology Museum with some incredible gold pieces from Alexander the Great's time. Late-night gyros are always a good thing. Then there was the evening that my friend and I sat and drank Metaxa next to some ancient ruins at dusk. The waitress gave us weird looks, probably because, as my friend put it, 'I ordered us the old man drink.' I think my favorite thing, though, was the night we drove up to Ano Poli, or the old town, to take in the amazing views and walk the narrow streets. Then we raced the sun and made it up to an even higher hill in the woods with a view of the entire city to watch the sun go down. It was also pretty great to just drive around the city with the windows down listening to Greek pop songs.
After a few days in Thessaloniki, I was off to Naoussa, a small town to the west of Thessaloniki where my great grandparents were from. Naoussa is probably one of the most interesting and beautiful places in Greece that no one really knows about. It's in the mountains and there are gorgeous fruit tree and grape farms all around. The town itself also has a river with lots of waterfalls running through it and it has two absolutely beautiful parks. It's also a pretty amazing place because it's the location of the school that was run by Aristotle where he taught Alexander the Great. I don't care if you're not really into history, that's still ridiculously cool. The school is basically a series of caves by a stream and it's preserved as an outdoor museum now.
Also, in a neighbouring town, there's the site where King Phillip II, Alexander the Great's father, was buried and had his palace. They have a museum there which is by far my favorite museum in the world which was built around the tomb of King Phillip, so you can actually go down into the site and see the door to the tomb. It's pretty incredible to walk down the creaky wooden steps into the cool darkness and stare at this marble tomb that's thousands of years old, especially when there's no one else down there and the sounds of the people in the museum above you are muffled. It's a good place to pretend that you're Indiana Jones. The artifacts from the tombs are also on display and it's crazy how well the delicate gold crowns and other royal accoutrements survived. Alright, that's enough of my mild archaeology obsession.
There's also a more personal attachment I have with Naoussa; other than the wonderful family that I have there, there was recently a monument put up of my great, great-grandfather who was killed while trying to negotiate a peace with Bulgarian armed bands who had been attacking the population while Greece was under Ottoman control. It's really nice having such a personal connection to the history in the area and I loved getting back to my Greek roots. Plus, it seems pretty fitting now that I'm studying conflict resolution and insurgencies.
It's only been a week and I already wish I could be back in Greece.
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