Athens - hit the road running!
Friday May 19, 2023
We woke up this morning at the port in Athens and hit the ground running (maybe a bit if an overstatement for 20 people at the end of a 23 day trip!). Gift from a friend of a sleeping berth for the night on board - what a wonderful and restful treat!
Our first stop was a view of the Corinth canal that cuts across the isthmus/land bridge that connects mainland Greece with the Peloponnese in the south. Roman Emperor Nero was the first to try and dig the canal - using Jewish slaves - but of course this was impossible until dynamite. So the idea of a canal connecting the Ionic gulf (and Adriatic Sea) with the Saronic Gulf ( and the Aegean Sea) was not realized until the late 1800s. This location between east and west is part of what made the ancient city of Corinth so important - trade and the movement of goods and people.
Our next stop was at some archeological remains of the diolokos. This was a paved track across the isthmus on which goods / people and entire ships could be dragged from the Adriatic side of the isthmus to the Aegean side. This avoided sailing the dangerous seas around the southern end of the Peloponnese. Historians wrote about the existence of this track from the mid 400’s BC through to the 2nd century AD, but the thinking is that it probably existed several centuries before that.
Then on to the archeological site of Corinth. The temple to Apollo is the classic picture that you will recognize from this site. But more fun is walking the streets and looking into the various areas of shop and imagining what it was like for Paul and Pricilla and Aquila as tent makers in this busy and hedonistic port town. people from all over the Greco Roman world would come through here related to trade or to the Isthmian Games. Corinth is also pretty near to Delphi. In the museum there are some items attesting to the Jewish presence in Corinth, though the synagogue has not yet been found. It is possible to see the location of the Bema where Paul appeared before pro counsel Galio when being persecuted and beaten by some of the Jewish leaders. There are still active excavations happening at this site.
On the way back to Athens we stopped at the excavations of the Biblical port of Cenchrae . This was a large port and mentioned in the book of Romans by Paul.
After a bit of a rest at the hotel in Athens, we walked up to the acropolis to see the Parthenon and other monuments and temples- many of which Paul saw when in Athens - commenting in his discussion with the members of the Areopagus on Mars Hill that there was even a monument to “the unknown God”. Paul went on to introduce them to the one true God that they did not yet know. We spent a few minutes standing on Mars hill recalling this encounter.
Also visited the Acropolis Museum, which a bit newer and is an incredible building with the findings and embellishments of the Parthenon displayed and their placement on the building clearly demonstrated.
