Olympia Visit

Today we arrived in the small fishing village called Katakolon, Greece. We took a forty minute bus ride to the city of Olympia, the birthplace of the Olympics. There we toured the ancient ruins, learning about the training and competition sites of the first Olympians. These athletes were required to stay on site to train for one month before the five day competition. The original Olympics consisted of five events: running, jumping, discus, javelin, and wrestling. In addition, we saw the ruins of the temple which once held the Statue of Zeus, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. It cost 300,000 euros to restore just one pillar of this temple!

(Click to enlarge all collages)

Following our tour of the ruins, we traveled to the Archaeological Museum, which holds many of the items excavated from the ruins. There were items from the Iron and Bronze Ages as well as a number of ancient marble statues which were part of the temples and buildings of Ancient Olympia. We personally enjoyed seeing items from Phidias’s workshop. He was the man who sculpted the statue of Zeus as well as sculptures on the Parthenon, which we look forward to seeing tomorrow!