How to Spend Easter, 2010

In the Greek Orthodox Church the resurrection is traditionally celebrated right after Midnight with church bells, fireworks and a pilgrimage to the church for about a 30-minute ritual after which churchgoers return home for a traditional soup prior to bedtime! (Then, the big family feast with lamb roasted outdoors on a spit is held on Easter afternoon.) Unfortunately, while we had good intentions, Nancy & I slept through the Midnight pilgrimage to the church and weren't even able to attend a sunrise service due to an 8:00 a.m. departure of our tour bus.

Our Globus Tour consisted of 32 people, mostly from the U.S., Australia and New Zealand. Our first destination on Easter Sunday was Thermopylae where Leonidas and his band of 300 brave Spartans, assisted by 700 Thespians, tried to hold-off Xerxes and his million man invading Persian army at a narrow mountain pass in 480 B.C. As most are aware, all of the brave defenders perished.

Lunch on Easter was fascinating -- since the whole tour group walked through the kitchen and indicated to the servers what we'd like on our plates. Then, we were all encouraged to take an Easter egg, colored bright red, to supplement our meal!

The highlight of the day was arriving at Meteora, seeing the remarkable rock formations (where monks once lived in caves), and then touring two of the monasteries which had originally been built high atop the rocks in protection against the Turks. The Varlaam Monastery was really unique since monks (+ equipment and supplies) were actually hoisted up to the monastery in a basket by means of a rope pulley system. The whole scene was beautiful, obviously aided by the many flowering fruit trees. - rw