Thessaly is a historical landscape in northern Greece between Macedonia, Epeiros and Central Greece. Thessaly was once the settlement area of the tribe of Thessaloi.
It is bounded by the mountain ranges of Olympos in the north, the Pindos in the west, the Othrys in the south, and the Ossa in the east. In between, the fertile Thessalian plain stretches. The main rivers through the Thessalian plain are the Titarisios and the Pinios.
Trikala: Trikala is at the same location as the Homeric Trikka before, surmounted by a Byzantine fortress, which was built on a wooded hill overlooking the remains of an ancient acropolis. Homer mentions the city Trikka as the origin of Asklepios cult. In the region are also well known monasteries of Meteora!
Once again on the way in the direction of Meteora, we choose the highway 15, which branches off from the highway at Grevena in the direction of Kalambaka and crosses the Venetikos River on an old metal bridge construction.
On the Pelion you will find more than 40 mountain villages and small coastal towns, some of them look back to a long lasting history and some can hardly be seen today in dense forests.
As one of the attractions in the region around Volos, there is so-called Pilion railway, which with a track width of only 600 mm belongs to the really attractive Narrow Gauge Railway, and because of that certainly is more like a model railway in big seize. But more about that later.
A visit to the city and port of Volos lead us along the promenade at the harbor to the Argonaut monument and through the pedestrian zone of Volos later on and as expected already, it was quite relaxed.
Kato Gatzea is a small fishing village on the west side of the Pelion Peninsula, surrounded by immense large olive groves and surrounded by the foothills of the Pelion Mountains.
After our arrival in Kastraki was still time for a small tour into the village, where we admired the blossoms of wild flowers but also in some of the gardens.
Hiking is a wonderful activity in the nature, is relaxing and exciting at the same time, not only when the area is like Meteora and, in addition to medieval monasteries, also offering magnificent rock landscapes.
We were again on the way to Meteora, because a national, Greek Climbing Festival will take place on the mountain pillars and at Camping Vrachos on the next weekend that had caught our attention.
Our tours through the countryside at Meteora had led us into Kastraki / Kalambaka city center too and, as a small town with no fewer than 8,330 inhabitants, is now interesting to tourists due to a variety of restaurants, cafes, shopping abilities and strolling too.
During our first passage through the formations of the Meteora rocks, we already noticed the numerous caves in the rocks, some of which were shared by the monks for a more independent living or due to confiscation.
The first impressions of our visit to the Metéora Monasteries we had already put online in our blog, now more information about this unique landscape with its medieval monastic buildings will follow.
In Greek mythology, in addition to Mount Olympus, the Pindos is known as the residence of the gods, here as one of the places where the Muses are said to have gathered around Apollo.