Farewell Greece
Casamara
John & Susan Simpson
Sun 24 Aug 2025 06:01
After leaving Corinth it was only a short drive to meet up with Norton and Elaine at their beautiful home on the Argolic gulf near to Argos (not the British catalogue showroom which John used to work for!). We’d heard so much about the building of the property it was great to see the end result, which was superb, and to spend a few days with them. With them we visited Mycenae, one of the centres of Greek civilisation in the second millennium BC. The city walls were built with huge grey blocks of stone which reminded us of the stonework of the Khmer temples in Cambodia, though of course those are much more recent. We also visited Epidauros and the huge ancient theatre, built in the late 4th century BC. The theatre is still used today and was set up for an orchestral concert that evening. We considered buying tickets but it was soooooo hot, we went back to cool off in the pool instead. The Lion Gate, Mycenae Theatre at Epidauros. To give an idea of scale, John and Elaine are seated in front of the black sound and lighting tent part way up the tiered seating After a relaxing few days, we set off from Norton and Elaine’s house to complete our mission to see as many places in Greece visited by St Paul as we could manage. We flew to Kos and spent our wedding anniversary in a lovely hotel in Kardamena. From there we were able to hire a motorbike and whizzed around the island, enjoying the breeze but cooking slightly inside our crash helmets! St Paul and his companions stopped in Kos briefly on their way back to Jerusalem from Paul’s third missionary journey. They were again on a sailing boat so we visited the harbour in Kos Town, as well as the simply named Western Archaeological Zone. Somehow that seems too ordinary a name for the scale of the remains of Kos Town in Roman times. The island was under Roman rule for over 500 years, beginning in 120 BC, so we could imagine Paul and his companions walking these streets and alleyways having stepped off the sailing boat in the harbour. Western Archaeological Zone, Kos Town The year after John and I got married, we had a holiday with my parents in Rhodes, and that was where John first got the sailing bug, having started windsurfing. Windsurfing led to yachting, which led to sailing around the world. Our return visit, forty years later, followed the route that St Paul took from Kos to Rhodes, on his way to Jerusalem. He was on his sailing boat, whereas we took the faster option of the high speed ferry operated by Dodekanisos Seaways. I’d booked an apartment in Ixia, across the road from a wing foiling school, thinking that John could hire some kit there and get a few days on the water. What I hadn’t realised was that the hotel we’d stayed in originally with my Mum and Dad was a few minutes walk away, and that the school where he’d learned to windsurf was the very same one that had now branched out into offering wing foiling. What a coincidence! The school was still as good as it was when we were last here and John had a fine time practising the complex art of wing foiling. Later, our family flew out to spend 10 days with us in a villa on the south side of the island. There are no specific references to where St Paul went in Rhodes, other than that it was a brief visit, but we all had a day out in Rhodes Town to see the gate in the city walls where, it is alleged, St Paul would have entered the city after disembarking in the harbour., John wing foiling in Ixia A family visit to St Paul’s Gate, Rhodes Town Waving farewell to the family after a great holiday, we finished our Greek odyssey with a few nights in Athens. Wow! It was such a spectacular conclusion to our travels. Not only were we blown away by the grandeur of the Acropolis but when we visited the Roman Agora to see where St Paul might have lingered, we discovered a whole exhibition recounting his journeys through Greece. There were all the places we’d visited, neatly set out with associated archaeological artefacts and summaries of the significance of his visit to each place. St Paul visited Athens in 50 or 51 AD whilst on his second missionary journey, and his Areopagus sermon marked a key moment in the spread of Christianity because he was able to present his message to the intellectual elite of Athens. The Areopagus is a rocky hill in the shadow of the Acropolis, and was said to be where Paul gave his sermon. Whether or not this is the exact spot, a plaque marked with the words of the sermon is attached to the hill shown in the photo below. View over the Areopagus from the Acropolis We had a wonderful time in Greece and travelling in the steps of St Paul gave the journey a focus that we needed in a country so full of history and archaeological remains that it would be easy to become overwhelmed. Seeing the vastness and difficulty of the terrain St Paul travelled on foot or by cart, and learning about the set backs he faced on the way, gave us renewed admiration for his courage and determination. He really was a man on a mission and absolutely critical to the spread of the Christian faith. Summary from the Apostle Paul exhibition, Athens Our mission now was to return to Malaysia to retrieve Casamara from her shed in Pangkor Marina, and to prepare her for the next leg of our sailing journey - across the Indian Ocean. We take with us many happy memories of our travels since we lifted Casamara out of the water in November. Now it's time for the next chapter ….. |