Day Trip to Edessa

Our morning started VERY early, about 5 am. We got up to get ready because we had to be on the city bus by 6 to get to the train station and leave there at7 am fro Edessa Greece. It took a little under two hours to get there. While we were there we toured Edessa for a few hours and then took a taxi to some hot springs about 20-30 min. away. Edessa was beautiful. A small little town but there was a lot to see. We lucked out too with a good day of weather. It was about 10 degrees Celcius [or aout 50 degrees] so it was actually a really nice day and the sun was really warm and the wind wasn't too bad.

Too early in the morning for picutres...but.... heres Britney and Stephanie

and me, Annie [haha] and Vasilios.

This is the train station in Edessa...

This is a veiw of the beautiful coutry side... right behind me is the city.
This one is just showing you can see for miles [its not about the truck :) ]

There thats better...


Start of waterfall number one. There was a channel literally right thru the city....



The top of the waterfall....

The waterfall starting to fall.... [they had a lot of stairs and platforms so you could see the water fall from different levels]
Still on its way down....

At the bottom of waterfall number one!

And again....it was beautiful


Theres me and the waterfall = )

This sign was by the second waterfall...
[Great and wonderful are thy deeds O Lord God the Almighty! Who shll not fear and glorify thy name o lord] the text is kind of hard to read
Top of waterfall number 2 [MY FAVORITE]
IT WAS SOO BEAUTIFUL.... [I actually got really wet taking this picture because I wanted to be close the the waterfall :D...it was loud and the waterfall created a lot of wind because of how fast the water was moving]


mmmm.....Wonderful! I may blow this picture up when I get home
you could go BEHIND this waterfall :D

All the way at the bottom of the waterfall...

between the waterfalls they had this cute little water mill and there were like 10 little waterfalls...it was cute
Then we went and wandered around an old hemp factory and the city. There was literaly NO ONE in the hemp factory but it provided and amazing view.... some of the doors were open so we peaked but it didn't make much sence to us...haha]

Hemp factory [I didn't take many picutres of the hemp factory but this one is SO typical Greece...cobblestones and close buildings]

wandering around...

Small church on high rock...
View from the church.... breathtaking!

Houses I wouldn't mind living in!

Then after we were done wandering around the city we took a taxi about 20 min. to some hot springs... the water [as u can see] is SO clean and clear.

This is just the river that was running....

you can see the hot spring....the waterfall falling into the pool was warm! it was so cool....HOWEVER the other waterfall outside of the pool was NOT warm...it was sooo cold! people were jumping out of the hot pool and going and standing [brasing themselves] under the other waterfall and RUNNING back...we even did it that why I know its so cold!


The pool.... there were mostly white rocks on the bottom of the pool....

there were so many little waterfalls....it was beautiful
This picture was taken in the hemp factory .... its def. going in a frame when i get home!

again....
the ONLY group picture we took all day = D... it goes [from left to right] me, britney, annie, stephanie and vasilios

All in all we had a FANTASTIC day! we were really tired by the time we went home but it has probably been the best 30 eruo I've spent here so far! I have a lot more pictures if you would like to see them but they take forever to upload onto the computer!

love,

Sarah

Heres a video of the first waterfall... its really loud but I thought you would enjoy the experience... theres a greeting from my friends I went with also...haha. ENJOY :D

TAVERNA TUESDAY!!!

So the study abroad kids have started a new tradition here in Greece....called Taverna Tuesday! A taverna is a restaurant where u order food family style [you order one plate and it feeds a couple people]. So if you go with a group you order a couple meat dishes and maybe some appetizers and then everyone just takes a little bit of each. [such a good way to eat!! this way you get to taste all of the good food instead of just whatever you ordered and the bill is a lot less too :D] Well I was just going to stay in for the night but I decided I needed a little fun in my life so I tagged along with everyone else.

There are about 80 study abroad students and I kid you not when I say over half went to this ONE taverna and ate. It was so good and so much fun. There is always live Greek music and the atmosphere is friendly and we all just have a good time!

SIDE NOTE: here in Greece there are people [gypsies] that come into restaurants and try and sell things [cd, flowers, kleenex (no joke), raffle tickets.... basically everything and anything]...The craziest thing is that this is allowed in Greece...

Well tonight there was a little boy that came and sang and played his drum [his brother was across the street at the other Taverna]. He got up on a chair and played his drum and sang a song. After, of course, he came around and collected money. [it honestly breaks your heart to see these small kids out trying to make money....just to let you know he came at like 12:30 tonight] I have a video but the music was too loud so it didn't turn out but I have pictures. So ENJOY!!!




Jacci dancing ON THE TABLE to some Greek Music...[mom never let me do that ;) ]

LITTLE boy playing for us....he was SOOO good!

AGAIN.....Britney and I trying OCTOPUS!!! for the first...and probably LAST.... time! Billy in the background with the REST of the kalamai in his mouth [BOYS ;)] hahaha Britney and I enjoying ourselves!!! [we need TANS...soon enough!]

Events of the past week...

All of these students are from Eau Claire. There are some that aren't pictured [probably about 5 more] we are big group!

Sorry the posts have gotten a little bit spread out but during the week, with school, nothing really interesting happens! But I have a few things now I can tell you about.

Carnival

Carnival is a celebration [on Thursday] that is part of the Easter tradition. Its like catholics "fat Tuesday". Instead its called Barbecue Thursday and everyone cooks lots and lots of meat to eat it "for the last time". Most people still eat it but its just a tradition. But they celebrate much like Mardi Gras. Everyone dresses up in like Halloween costumes and masks and goes out to eat meat and celebrate. Ioannis, the guy that planned the "Rock" concert, organized for us to go to an area in Thessaloniki and join in the festivities. It was really cool and fun to see. There was entertainment, and just a bunch of people showed up.

Britney and I in our Masks in front of the COOL doorway.

My Cool mask and edited photo :)

MOM I FOUND HIM!!!!! haha I'm just kidding. It just some random guy that jumped in the picture with me.

Museum

My art teacher is head of the field trip club at ACT and today we went to the Archeological Museum and looked at ruins found from in Thessaloniki and the surronding areas. It was so amazing. There were marble statues and the detail is PHENOMINAL!!! u see thes statues in books and pictures but when you are standing face to face with one you can see all of the groves and and details of the face and the clothes. Many of the statues are broken [usually the arms, legs and heads] because they are so old but even those are .... WOW! The museum was set up very cleverly. They were in groups like law, house, burial, religion, the jewelery was all together, and the items found in Thessaloniki were in an area by themselves too. There was actually a lead coffin and a bones of a woman inside. many people probably think its disrespectful but the reason they put it in the museum was because the coffin was so well sealed some of here hair was still on her head and in the casket....it was creepy but really mesmerizing all at the same time. Towards the end there were columns and a door way to a temple. Most of it was reconstucted but it was like real life!

Ancient colums that some parts have been reconstructed to make all the pieces fit. THEY ARE HUGE I probably couldn't fit my arms around them!!!

Entrence to a tomb [you can see how much was reconstructed but they wanted to give the full effect. The circle thing on the ground in front is a base of a column.

A Beautiful arch. The detail was AWESOME! so perfect and symetrical...I couldn't imagine creating something so beautiful.

Mosaic floor. Just to show the detail....there were faces and it honestly looked like a paiting.

This was my favorite mable face because there were holes in his hair [like the curls were three dimentional and you could see through them just like you could if it was real]

These showed some one of the hairsytles women would do. WOW! and of course their amazing work with marble :D

The mosaic floor I was talking about above.... beautiful isn't it?!?!

These are tomb stones... 'fun' fact: the person seated in the pictures are the ones that have died.

Art work on some of their pottery.

Beatuful statue of a woman....JUST LOOK AT THAT DETAIL. I know I keep saying it but when you see it in person you appreciate the lines and the hard work more. Its all carved in Marble...thats like ROCK!!!

They decorated their beds with ivory these are some recovered pieces.

CREEPY I know but.... its kind of amazing if you think about it!

They were a very small people I have found. Short and just skinny...fragile like it seems. Your bones shrink about 20% after a while but the coffin doesn't and it was small!

Gold wreath. All of the gold is so shiny becaue real gold doesn't tarnish [I WANTED IT ;D]

Open Market

Every saturday they have an open air market and Britney and I drug ourselves out of bed today to go. I'm really glad that I went. They had everything [they even had toilet paper :D haha]. They have all of this fabric [like chifon and silk-like material with different colors and styles i want some so my mom can make me some curtains ;) ] and clothes and jewlery, purses, wallets, it was really great! And everything is really cheap...so thats not good:S but i will resist!

Tonight is the last night of the carnival celebration [its supposed to only be thrusday but they drag it out all weekend] so we are probably going to experience some more.

Next weekend we have a long weekend [no class on Monday] so a few of us girls are planning on going to Edessa and going to the hotsprings there. I'll let you know if I go! and Britney and I booked our flight to Rome for spring break. We are going to book the rest of the flights tomorrow.

SPRING BREAK PLANS

Britney and I are going to Rome while Dewey and Annie are in Egypt. We are then meeting up in Barcelona, then off to Paris, then Dublin where I will hopefully get to meet up with a girl I went to School with [all the way from grade school: Tessa Jonson for those of you who know her], then its of to LONDON where I'm meeting up with one of my best friends Ellen [Shes been there since the beging of January], then shes coming back with me to Greece for about a week and then she flies back to the States. So it should be a good time and leave me nice and broke :D but it will be worth it!

BUT Stephanie made me dinner so I'm going to RUN!!!

Love you all

I'll keep u posted [muah]

LOVE,

Sarah

ps thanks for reading!