Brentwoodian 2019

10 Greece Our week began with a shock to the system as we gathered at Hough roundabout at the freezing hour of 2am on the 27th October. Cut to me a few hours later watching Back to the Future on the plane, about to arrive in Greece; when we landed in the sun, we soon began our first coach journey of many on the trip, and visited the Hosios Loukas Monastery to get a flavour of Greek culture and religion. Set against natural mountain scenery, this was a beautiful place of stone walls and beautiful Byzantine art. Later on, we arrived at our first hotel before leaving again for an evening excursion to the nearby town of Galaxidi. The next day entailed another early start for a busy day of travel and visiting ancient sites. In the morning we drove to Delphi where, after a hefty amount of climbing, we were awaited by the sites of the legendary Oracle and the ancient Pythian Games. We also encountered an ungodly amount of stray cats, but were advised not to touch them because they would “give us fleas” or something. Afterwards we visited the museum on site where I felt particularly honoured to see statues of the brothers Cleobis and Biton who had featured in our GCSE Greek set text. The main attraction of the next day was Olympia, the site of the Ancient Olympics. As well as a very informative guided tour all about the history and events of the Olympics, we aptly entertained ourselves with a footrace and then spent some time in the sun with a large white dog who was quickly nicknamed Artemis (again, probably had fleas but oh well)! Afterwards we ate lunch and travelled to our next and favourite hotel, the Hotel Minoa, where we spent our evening playing ‘Go Fish’ and having chats standing in the sea. The next day we woke up early to get on our travels to the theatre at Epidauros. This is the most famous amphitheatre in the world, and I was most impressed by the ingenuity of architecture; we could sit right at the top and still hear Mr Clark quoting Aristophanes all the way down at the bottom. Later on, we visited the Tomb of Agamemnon, an impressive dome-like structure which did smell slightly musty. We then got back on the coach for a very short journey to the Ancient Citadel of Mycenae, where we were able to see the famous Lion Gate, the main entrance, and enjoyed a nice climb. I found it strange to be able to visit such a legendary place, which I felt I knew so little about; on the way up I learnt a lot more about the Mycenaeans, the origin of civilised Greek society. Following this, we visited a lovely seaside town called Nafplio where we roamed around, bought some souvenirs and ate some bright blue ice cream. On the fifth day (Halloween!), which I remember as being especially hot, we started off visiting Ancient Nemea. This was the site of the Nemean Games, in honour of the king, Lycurgus’, son who died in a celery field after being strangled by a snake. With this tragic death in mind we also visited the remains of the Temple of Zeus. Then we moved on to Ancient Corinth, an excellent opportunity to provide more information to complement my study of Medea, Euripides’ play "I found it strange to be able to visit such a legendary place, which I felt I knew so little about..."