Last week, Kay kindly humored my offbeat idea of heading to Thessaloniki, in the Macedonian region of northern Greece, for a four day city break. I have been intrigued by Greece's second largest city ever since travelling to Athens a few years ago, when I saw a lot of references to it in the media and culture during the trip. I felt like it might offer a more eastern European flavor (it's only 60 miles from the Bulgarian border) than the more popular Peloponnese and Greek islands. And we certainly were not disappointed. Thessaloniki is a lush, prosperous, and bustling mini-city in which it is incredibly easy and delightful to spend time. There are so many historic buildings to explore: a vast amount of ancient Greek ruins, breathtaking mosaics housed in early Byzantine churches dotted around town, a beautifully-revamped waterfront area, lively outdoor markets, and much more. Here were some of our/my highlights:
archaeological ruins: just strolling around the downtown area, you suddenly encounter a triumphal arch from the era of the emperor Galerius; a Roman forum; a bathhouse, and not to mention that several of the neighboring towns have extensive ruins and gorgeous tomb artifacts from the era of Alexander the Great (his family hails from Pella, a town we visited about 40 minutes from Thessaloniki). I felt that apart from Delphi, the ruins we saw in Macedonia and certainly the quality of the museums were higher than anything I saw on the typical 'ancient Greece itinerary' I did with the school back in 2007.
bougatsa: a cream or cheese-based filo dough pastry, typically eaten for breakfast--I swear there were about 3 bakeries per every citizen in Thessaloniki and hey, you know me, I wasn't complaining! Any town that is that much into baked goods goes down well in my book for sure.
pork and quite quaffable carafes of local white wine: I partook in both of these treats several times. I had to take advantage of being outside of Egypt! Kay amiably shared with me.
churches: several of the churches in Thessaloniki still in use date back to the 400s AD (one church even took over an old Roman bath complex) and have been carefully restored from the years in which they were converted into mosques. As I mentioned before, the golden mosaics, often depicting lush vegetation or saints in heroic poses, were stunning.
ease of transport: it is so user-friendly to navigate around Thessaloniki. All the bus stops have digitalized signs showing the order and frequency of the next 5 bus arrivals; once on the bus, there is a digitalized sign telling you what the next stop is, in both Greek and English, as well as announcements in both languages; a way above average bus terminal; the grid pattern of streets makes navigation a synch; and the presence of several parks and streets with little traffic. If I'd encountered all this in Athens, I would have guessed that it had been installed for the Olympics, but why Thessaloniki has so many modern creature comforts I don't know. I was certainly grateful for it!
kindness of strangers: Kay and I discovered that it's best to explore the attractions of Pella, which has the excavations of the ancient (300 BC era) city on one side of town and the amazingly well-designed and upscale archaeological museum on the other side of town, by rental car. Seeing as we arrived by public bus, hoofing it around the not insignificant distances was mandatory. But how did the folks at both the museum and ancient site help us out? They immediately offered to give us a lift in between places.
views of Mt. Olympus: even though it was hazy each day, Mt. Olympus stood out as a snow-capped behemoth across the bay, its uppermost peak shrowded in whispy clouds. I could see why folks in antiquity would assume this had to be the place where the gods lived.
