This Is Sparta!

Anonymous

Confession: I've never actually seen the movie 300. I remember when it came out a couple of years ago, and every boy in my school went into fits of ecstasy just talking about it. They thought it was the greatest movie released since Casablanca. But despite all the frenzy, I never saw the movie myself.

Nevertheless, I was able to enjoy today's class trip to Sparta and Mystras just as much as the next Lute. I even understood the joke when my classmates would randomly shout out "THIS IS SPARTA!" or re-enact fight scenes from the film. All in all today was a great day to be traveling in Greece.

Some of you might be asking yourselves, What on earth is Mystras? Believe me, I was asking the same thing when I first learned we'd be visiting the site. It turns out Mystras is an incredible complex of Byzantine ruins, located on a hill just outside the modern town of Sparti. The ruins used to comprise a great Byzantine town, complete with a castle, palace, and several churches. All that's left of most of the buildings are low piles of rocks. Even so, the place was breathtaking to behold.

We started our tour at the castle, high above the rest of the town. One of my classmates remarked exploring the castle was like being on a giant playground. No area of the site was off limits, so we had a lot of fun climbing up the walls and down into ancient chambers.

From the castle, we made our way through the upper and lower segments of the town. As I walked and snapped photos, I tried to imagine what Mystras must have looked like 800 years ago. It's a difficult thing to imagine when all you have left are low rock walls that outline former buildings. Yet I've come to the conclusion that if Mystras is beautiful today, in 2011, it must have been positively breathtaking during it's Byzantine hey-day.

Other highlights of our tour were a stop at a working convent, where a very kind nun offered us pieces of Greek delight (which is basically Turkish delight... let the Narnia references begin) and a small museum that had many medieval artifacts on display. We also encountered a very vocal cat that followed us for quite a way through the ruins.

So despite my total 300 illiteracy, today was another fantastic day exploring Greece. Tomorrow we begin the home stretch of our J-term odyssey as we journey to Rhodes in the Mediterranean Sea. Until next time... THIS IS SPARTA!!!!!