Page 56 Daily Mail, Wednesday, August 28, 2019
Escape
T
he poet and painter edward
Lear once remarked that ‘no
pen or pencil’ could do justice
to the mountain monasteries
at Meteora, and I’m happy toprove him right.
Actually, I was meant to be sailing with my
eccentric Aunt Marigold and her husband
Winslow. But adverse weather had kept us
in Thessaloniki — and so, to avoid cabin
fever, we set off for Meteora.
The three-hour drive into the heart of
central Greece ended in our first glimpse of
these rock pillars, which rear up inexplicably
from the plain.
What formed them? The geological jury is
out. Point is, they’re there, and they were
there a millennium ago, when hermits first
began climbing the rock-faces in search of
solitude.
This was phase one. Phase two was when
groups of monks, fleeing Ottoman persecu-
tion, wandered west from Mount Athos in
search of somewhere safer.
The pioneer was St Athanasius, who was
also known as Athanasius the Meteorite,
though not because of any special powers
of levitation.
That said, some believed that, in order to
have found Great Meteoron, the largest
monastery, he must have been carried up
there by some enormous bird.
More likely, he commissioned one of those
PERFECT PEACE IN GREECE
agile hermits to scale the peak
known as the Broad Rock, and set
up a winch and windlass, which
were then used to lift the necessary
building materials.
For centuries, the only way up
for non-climbers was via a network
of rickety ladders tied to the
rock-face.
Failing that, you fired a gun. At
this signal, if you were lucky, the
monks might let down a net. You
then clambered into it, and got
hoisted hundreds of feet into the
air, while the bearded brothers
sweated at the windlass.
Sadly, when I visited, this option
was no longer available. Instead,
Marigold, Winslow and I ascended
via the staircases that were carved
into the rock in the early 20th
century. Then we paid the few
euros to enter.M
ARIGOLd, being a
woman, was required to
don a skirt to cover her
legs. We didn’t want
those monks getting frisky.
All the monasteries are worth
visiting, but perhaps the grandest,
after Great Meteoron, is Varlaam.
As you step into the narthex, orentrance-chamber, of its main
church, you’re assailed by a
fantastically gruesome fresco of
The Second Coming.
From under the throne of a
placid-looking Christ there flows
a great river of blood, dotted with
the bodies of sinners, who are
either being forked by grinning
demons or else gorged upon by a
variety of voracious monsters.
The traveller Robert Curzon,
who visited in 1834, noted that the
monks had ‘a singular love’ for
‘everything horrible and hideous’.
But it’s not all gore at Meteora.
There’s beauty, too, in abun-dance, in the crucifixion fresco in
Varlaam’s nave, which is gazed
down upon by the oddly smiling
faces of the sun and moon.
Many monasteries also bear
witness to amazing crafts-
manship, from the ornate doors
of the church at Varlaam, to the
rich epitaphios (a cloth
representing the body of Christ)
at Great Meteoron.
And of course, whenever you
step outside, there are spectacu-
lar views of the other monasteries
and the plain beyond.
To live like an eagle in the clear
bright air, with nothing to distractfrom your books and meditations
— it must have been an extra-
ordinary life, and be so now for the
occupants of the six monasteries
that still operate. As a tourist, you
get only a glimpse. But it’s one
you won’t forget.TRAVEL FACTS
The three-star hotel Pyrgos
Adrachti in the village of Kastraki
has double rooms from £60, with
views of the Meteora rocks
(hotel-adrachti.gr). Easyjet has
returns to Thessaloniki from
Gatwick from £101 (easyjet.com).Mystical mountains, divine views -- Meteora’s hilltop monasteries are heavenly
High church: The Roussanou Monastery overlooking the towering rock pillars of Meteora in the mountains of central Greeceby THOMAS W.
HODGKINSON
, y, ,Don Bradman’s
hometown will
bowl you over
WHEN Wisden, the annual cricket Bible,
invited 100 experts on the game to name
their five greatest cricketers of the 20th
century, only one player was selected by
every member of the panel: Sir Donald
Bradman (1908-2001).
Although he lived for most of his play-
ing career in Adelaide, where he batted
for South Australia, Bradman was brought
up in Bowral, a town in the Southern
Highlands of New South Wales, close to
the cricket ground, naturally.
It’s a two-hour train ride south from
Sydney, followed by a short walk past the
town’s row of antique and collectibles
shops, to the Bradman Museum and
International Cricket Hall of Fame.
Bradman’s modest boyhood home,with a white picket
fence at 52
Shepherd Street,
is just round the
corner. The
super-keen can
arrange special
tours of the
property to see
the old water tank Bradman used to
bounce a golf ball off and then hit using a
cricket stump.
This spot has gone down in legend as it
was here he honed his technique (see
the grainy YouTube video of him later
recreating his youthful endeavours).
The museum is next to the pleasant(^) little Bradman Oval cricket ground and
it’s a veritable treasure trove of
Bradmanophilia. Here you’ll find a bat
with his signature from the famous
‘Invincibles’ side that was undefeated in
England in 1948. Close by is his baggy
green Australian test cap from 1936.
Another room features newspaper
headlines including one from the Daily
Press: ‘Bradman versus England’ — he
was so good the rest of the Australian
team hardly mattered.
There are lovely old pictures: one of him
with the Invincibles at Tilbury Dock,
another of him meeting the baseball
legend Babe Ruth in New York in 1932. And
then there are the stats. His average Test
batting average? A mere 99.94 including
29 centuries in 52 matches. A display says
this is ‘nearly twice a good as the next
elite player’.
And it all began in sleepy little Bowral in
Sydney’s Southern Hills.
TRAVEL FACTS
TICKETS for International Cricket Hall of
Fame £11 each, internationalcrickethall.
com. For tours of Bradman’s home, visit
52shepherdstreet.com
Test of time: The Bradman Museum in Bowral and, inset, local hero Don Bradman
Pictures: ALAMY/GETTY
TOM CHESSHYRE