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Walking
into the river. An unforgetable experience.
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It
took us only one day and a half to do so many things, some of them
for first time.
We
woke up early in the morning to begin our trip
from Agrinion, Greece. Our
first
destination was
the
Necromanteion, the ancient Greek temple of necromancy next to
Acherontas river. And then we had a lot of things to do
on
schedule, arround the Acherontas river and a overnight stay to a
camp
close
to
Parga.
Join
us to this trip.
By:
Maria and Konstantina Konstantinou, Kate Alabasini
Necromanteion
Lots
of interesting stories and mythological information have tracked our
attention even before our arrival to the Necromanteion. We were
at Mesopotamos, the village were the Necromanteion is, and we took
the road up to the hill, looking forward to see more.
Right
before the entance, a young man welcomed us ready to inform us about
for the activities we could find later to the river banks. He
gave us some brochures for horse riding, kayak and rafting. We passed
the gate after we took our tickets (4 euros or free for the students)
and start walk arround to the open rooms of the
Necromanteion.
Arround
the yard the storage spaces, the temple's rest rooms, the North
corridor and the chaplains rooms gave us a taste of the era, when
this place was full of people waiting to communicate with their
deads.
We
crossed the purification room and the East corridor, we took a good
look at the great
view and we entered the gate under the sign
“Labyrinth”. The room was not as ominous as its name. Actually it
bacame more and more interenting after
every step. The best part was the
underground (main) chamber. The arcade with the unique accoustic
effect was as much mysterious as we hoped and with the low light was
exactly the place that could make people feel like
that could come in touch with an other spiritual level.
Mythology
Cirki
says to Odysseus in an
Odyssey's rhapsody:
“Dock
your ship to the edge of the ocean, with the endless swirls, and go
to to the musty home of Hades. There to Acherontas, where
Piriphlegethon and Kokitos, that stem from Stiga, end. Odysseus goes
down to Hades to take the confirmation about the returning to his
home place, Ithake, from
the shade*
of seer Tiresias. The witch shows to Odysseus how to summon the
dead's souls. He must act a libation with honey-water, wine, water
and flour. He will pray and promisse sacrifissials to the deads. Then
he had to sacrifice a ram or sheep and the
shade
would appear to the river banks of Acherontas.
A
dead's soul, ike Odysseus mother, should drink blood to escape
from oblivion and give answers to the visitors.
The
chaplains were responsible for every visitor's initiation. They
tested them out by using psychological and physical straits into the
humid chambers of the temple to learn their intentions.
Visitors
could take their confirmation after they go
through a specific procedure. They had to keep the comfirmation
secret under the fear of death caused by an ungry god.
*Odysseus
travels to the Underworld and makes the offerings according to
Circe's instructions. The shades of the dead (shades = ghosts) gather
to drink the blood (gross) and then talk to Odysseus.
Acheron
Our
next destination was the beautiful river Acheron. The cold water was
exactly the place we wanted to be after a few hours under the hot sun
of Greece, but before that we desided to walk arround and see the
river banks. We discovered some details of the place and the sign
that guides visitors to the path that leads to Souli.
We
enjoyed the breeze under the high trees and the sound of the river.
The decision to dive into the cold water was taken only a few minutes
later and we swam from the river's fountain to the bridge's
direction. On our way we saw lots of
beautiful scenes and details with the
majestic gorge bending above our heads.
We
will tell you more for our journey in a few days. We will tell you
about our experiences, rafting, mountaineering and camping and show
you more beautiful scenes from Greece.
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