this eastern I wend together with my cousin to his weekend house in the saronic golf to be more precize its Kalamos is next to Oropos and you have a fantastic view to the saronic golf and to the Island evia
Kalamos is a half hour trip with the car from Athens(Maroussi)
enjoy
Fantastic view from the Balkony
you can see Evia
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and in the evening...
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and in the Morning
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the view from the Garden
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and in Kalamos
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and some fish....
to be grilled
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and know some pics from the Sanctuary of Amphiaraos
unfortunately it was closed (eastern) so that I could only take some pics from outside and the surrounding area but will go there when its open and a full report will follow....
here for what this is about....
the shrine was founded in the late 5th century BC and already by the 4th century it was a thriving spa/religious center with a temple, a long colonnade, baths, hostels, shops and, of course, the theater. Now as then a stream runs through it, separating the show-case buildings to the left of the entrance from the smaller residential and commercial ones on the right. The jumbled foundations of the latter have only recently been disentangled from the thick woods and underbrush that concealed them in the days when I used to make my pilgrimages. In fact, we had no inkling of their presence then, but loved to scramble up the opposite bank of the stream to admire the state of the art technology of the Hellenistic era – a water clock. It’s a little jewel. A rectangular ‘box’ about 2 meters deep set inside a larger square equipped with a small flight of stairs, it is a perfect example of the stone cutter’s art, as well as being a timepiece more reliable than a sundial. Perhaps it was used to schedule cures, sacrifices or events at the games. Time in those days was refreshingly imprecise, with no onus attached to not being ‘on time’ or ‘in’ it.
For about six hundred years the sanctuary was a favourite recourse for people seeking a solution to a problem or relief from an illness. The procedure was simple. After paying the entrance fee, the patient sacrificed a ram on the altar, which Pausanias says was divided up into sections, each sacred to a diverse group of deities, ranging from Jason and Hercules, to Zeus, Apollo, Athena and Aphrodite, plus Pan, the nymphs and two other river gods in addition to Amphiaraos.
What a luxury to be able to take one’s pick. The pilgrim, wrapping himself up in the fleece of the ram, would then go to sleep, hoping for a portentous dream, in the colonnade, which was lined with marble benches. After interpretation of the dream and any further treatment, which usually included baths in the miraculous waters, it was customary to thank the gods by throwing gold and silver coins into the stream. Needless to say, the priests encouraged this practice; they regularly fished them out and melted them into material for ex votos which they could sell at a good profit. The altar must have resembled the icon of the Virgin Mary in Tinos, so bedecked was it with symbolic images of children or afflicted body parts – legs, arms, eyes, breasts. Many such offerings have been found, made of both clay and precious metals
here we go
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Kalamos is a half hour trip with the car from Athens(Maroussi)
enjoy
Fantastic view from the Balkony
you can see Evia
and in the evening...
and in the Morning
the view from the Garden
and in Kalamos
and some fish....
to be grilled 
and know some pics from the Sanctuary of Amphiaraos
unfortunately it was closed (eastern) so that I could only take some pics from outside and the surrounding area but will go there when its open and a full report will follow....
here for what this is about....
the shrine was founded in the late 5th century BC and already by the 4th century it was a thriving spa/religious center with a temple, a long colonnade, baths, hostels, shops and, of course, the theater. Now as then a stream runs through it, separating the show-case buildings to the left of the entrance from the smaller residential and commercial ones on the right. The jumbled foundations of the latter have only recently been disentangled from the thick woods and underbrush that concealed them in the days when I used to make my pilgrimages. In fact, we had no inkling of their presence then, but loved to scramble up the opposite bank of the stream to admire the state of the art technology of the Hellenistic era – a water clock. It’s a little jewel. A rectangular ‘box’ about 2 meters deep set inside a larger square equipped with a small flight of stairs, it is a perfect example of the stone cutter’s art, as well as being a timepiece more reliable than a sundial. Perhaps it was used to schedule cures, sacrifices or events at the games. Time in those days was refreshingly imprecise, with no onus attached to not being ‘on time’ or ‘in’ it.
For about six hundred years the sanctuary was a favourite recourse for people seeking a solution to a problem or relief from an illness. The procedure was simple. After paying the entrance fee, the patient sacrificed a ram on the altar, which Pausanias says was divided up into sections, each sacred to a diverse group of deities, ranging from Jason and Hercules, to Zeus, Apollo, Athena and Aphrodite, plus Pan, the nymphs and two other river gods in addition to Amphiaraos.
What a luxury to be able to take one’s pick. The pilgrim, wrapping himself up in the fleece of the ram, would then go to sleep, hoping for a portentous dream, in the colonnade, which was lined with marble benches. After interpretation of the dream and any further treatment, which usually included baths in the miraculous waters, it was customary to thank the gods by throwing gold and silver coins into the stream. Needless to say, the priests encouraged this practice; they regularly fished them out and melted them into material for ex votos which they could sell at a good profit. The altar must have resembled the icon of the Virgin Mary in Tinos, so bedecked was it with symbolic images of children or afflicted body parts – legs, arms, eyes, breasts. Many such offerings have been found, made of both clay and precious metals
here we go
