Oh my goodness Meteora.

Over winter break, some of the college students in one of the language classes went to this magical place in the mountains called Meteora and I reserved my bed in a nearby hostel the same night.The bus was practically empty but the ride was full of stunning views of the Mediterranean, periodic glimpses of the Rio-Antirion Bridge and coastal towns weaving between beaches and olive-green peninsulas. As the sun began to set the landscape transformed  as the bus moved inwards and upwards through the mountains of Greece's mainland. Once the sun had completely disappeared, leaving the sky a dark lavender, the full moon suddenly came over the mountain mighty and orange.  I lazily watched the moon until arriving at the Trikala bus station around 9 from where I took a cab to the hostel and hurried to bed.


I caught the  bus at 7:00am by vigorously flapping my arms to flag down the driver because I was waiting a couple hundred meters from where the actual bus stop was. The ride was dark but quick and  in no time I found myself standing in the center up Kalambaka looking up at a giant cliff with a monastery on top of it. I bought a doughnut the size of my face and a full thermos of coffee and headed through town. I found the first trail easy enough and as I started to head off into the hills I could here some really hungry puppies off in the distance. I kept following the trail and simultaneously the sound of the tiny pups.  I assumed they belonged to a farmer with a little piece of land or to a recluse who wanted to live outside of town and kept on trekking. The yipping was extremely loud now and had a slightly wild timbre to it. I came around a wide corner and about 50 feet ahead of me was a large dog with focused eyes and hair at full attention sitting in the center of the sound. I could see other adult dogs near this one but none of them noticed me. I started to step back slowly and without breaking eye contact the large dog barked and started towards me.  After that I don't remember hearing the puppies anymore. I turned around and ran as fast as I could down the trail back to town with the angry barking trailing close  behind me. By the time I reached the cobblestone the barking had stopped but I kept running until I was safetly on someones porch, just to be sure. I sat here catching my breath and recollecting my wits while listening to puppies cry faintly in the distance.

I chose to take a different trail on the other side of Kalambaka just to be safe and the whole way there I was jumping at everything that moved and stopped in my tracks when I heard a cow bell jingle just down the road. All of the sudden I saw an adorable goat poke its head out of some bushes and step onto the street. I would have just walked around it and kept going but it had multiple friends following, many with horns. I was cautiously waiting for these guys to make up their mind on which direction they wanted to go when out popped the leader of their little flock; a large white dog. One look at him and I just turned and started to walk anywhere but there. Instead of the cowbell fading off into the distance it was just as loud as when I left so I peaked around my shoulder and saw all of them following me. The dog was trailing at the back not even looking at me so I dropped my guard and pulled out my camera. When I lowered onto my knees to get the right angle of a goat eating some garbage the dog came running right up to me and planted a slobbery kiss right on my camera lens. Overjoyed by not being bitten and also by making a cuddly new friend I happily headed the same direction back towards the monasteries.

The second trail I followed did not contrast to the rest of the landscape as much as the first which made me a bit scared of losing it from time to time. I ran into the first fellow hiker of the day and asked him if I was going the right way via google translate. With a large smile he said in a mix of greek and extremely broken english that I was going the right way and would soon see the first two monasteries. After losing and relocating the trail multiple times an hour later I could finally see the top of the 1st monastery; on the other side of a large field enclosed by a 10 foot fence topped with barbed wire. One of the sides of the fenced field dropped off to a cliff so I just left the trail and started to follow the fence the other direction higher up the hill. Because of the curve of the hill I couldn't see how long the fence was and I was starting to get frustrated because it seemed to never end. When it finally did I was surrounded by thick brush but could see the paved road on the other side and was relieved because if I could get to the road I could just follow that to the monastery. I worked my way through the poky bushes until the road was right in front of me. Sadly, it sat at the bottom of a small cliff. I sat down exhausted, angry and thirsty because I had no water. I left at 7am and it was already 11 yet I still hadn't seen the first monastery! I took inventory of my priorities and told myself of all of the good things that have happened to me and reminded myself of where I was and what I was going to see later that day. I stood up and followed the edge of the cliff along the road through thick brush for about 20 minutes until finding the lowest part of the drop off and scaling my way down until finally touching my feet on the pavement like a sailor touching land for the first time in weeks.

I practically ran to the monastery and immediately bought two bottles of water and met the sweetest gold dog.  He was a monk stray and as I sat down to drink my water he came up to me for pets the same time a cat came and curled up on my lap. Hydrated, I said goodbye to my furry friends and checked out my first mastery which I actually found to be a bit disappointing.
Eager to see if the next one was better I headed down the road but I wasn't alone. The golden dog was right behind me. I gave him some more love, a little bit of water and asked him if he was going to come with me and he almost seemed to smile. I started back down the road and he was right by my side the whole time keeping my pace and staying on the side of the road as if he was trained. I was a bit sad to part with him when I got to the entrance of the second monastery but I thanked him for his company and went inside. This one was a bit prettier than the first but still not as grand as I imagined. As I stepped out of the doorway I was very happy to see the golden dog was still sitting there getting some pets from tourists. As I walked by him he immediately ditched the other tourists and started following me. He stayed by me like this the rest of the day. At every monastery he would patiently wait outside when I went in to look around and would happily run up to me when I was finished. The monasteries got more grand and beautiful the further we went and by the time we reached the last one we were both tired but very happy.
 
I didn't want to walk back to town without other people because of the dog situation in the morning so I asked some college exchange students from Singapore if I could join them. They happily said yes and thought that the dog was mine because they saw him waiting for me outside of a monastery earlier that day. Our decent to the town was full of nice conversation and halfway back down my dog friend disappeared into the trees. The four of us got dinner together as I waited for my train and when I left the restaurant my dog friend was curled up on the mat just outside. He was so excited when he saw me and after some final loves I had to leave him alone in Kalambaka and turned to start walking towards the train.