Monday, July 20, 2009
Finally we made it to Thermopylae (Greek for Gates of Fire)!
This was harder than it should have been to find, all the guide books give vague directions like "it's on the Athens road" and even google maps had it wrong. It took an extra 20km of driving and 2 stops for directions from locals but we found it!
Now the story of Thermopylae is really what started my whole venture into Greek history, so this stop was momentous for me. It's a great feeling to get somewhere that you REALLY wanted to get to, similar to what I felt when I made it to Africa the first time. I think a key to travelling is timing it right when you want to go the most, the urge to get to Greece had been festering for over 2 years. Part of me wanted to wait another year so I could plan it "just right" but I didn't want to risk losing the feeling I had. Like some military guy said: "a good plan executed today is superior to a great plan executed tomorrow".
We ended up planning a great trip anyway, but getting here now was important.
Being on the very spot I'd read and seen so much about was simply awesome.
Here's what the battlefield looks like today (taken from the very hill of their last stand)
Here's what this area used to look like :)
(from the great movie "300")
