Heading to Greece

OCTOBER 8, 2022 : In two weeks, we will be leaving for a 5-week trip to Greece. Our travels will take us to some major cities (Athens, Thessaloniki), some islands (Corfu, Crete), and many, many off-the-beaten-path places. The itinerary was mostly set based on the location of Jewish Heritage Sites. While in Greece we hope to verify many of the Jewish places we read about on the internet, find new Jewish sites, and in addition, visit the major Greek tourist attractions as well.

As usual, every day of the trip is already planned – where to go, what to see, where to sleep and even what to eat – for those cities with vegan restaurants. While making these plans, a few difficulties already arose. First, it seems that most Greek places can be spelled in English at least three different ways. This makes using Google Maps difficult. Some of our accommodations appear to be on streets that do not exist. Hopefully our hosts will provide understandable directions.

The trip starts with an El AL non-stop flight to Thessaloniki (using my frequent flyer points immediately before they expire!) After a few days there, we rent a car and start driving towards the north-east for a brief stay, and then head south. Our second Shabbat will be in Volos, a large port city on the Aegean Sea, where theoretically there is a Jewish congregation with Friday night services. Emails to get more information have gone unanswered. From there, we head north-west, for a few days of sightseeing at Meteora and the Zagori villages. For the third Shabbat we will be in Corfu – we hope. Although November is only three weeks away, the ferry schedules for November to Corfu have not yet been published. No possibility to buy our tickets now. Theoretically there are ferries to Corfu year-round – we will find out if that is true.

After a few days in Corfu, we head back to the mainland and make our way south towards Athens, via Delphi. Reaching Athens, we return the rental car and stay in an AirBnb in the middle of the city for five days. We booked a Jewish Tour of Athens for one of the mornings there. After Athens, we fly for a week to Crete. In Crete (the largest of the Greek isles), we will be most of the time in Chania, on the west end of the island and then spend the last couple of days on the eastern side of the island, in Heraklion. From Heraklion, we fly back to Athens, and then continue a few hours later home to Tel Aviv.

Along the way, we will stop at many not well-known places, where we will search for Jewish cemeteries, Holocaust memorials, remnants of synagogues and anything else that attests to the former Jewish presence in Greece.  Before the outbreak of World War II, some 77,000 Jews lived in 27 communities in Greece – the majority of them in Thessaloniki. Today only about 6000 Jews live in Greece, mostly in Athens.

So stay tuned. As usual, I will document our journey in this blog – mostly for me to remember what we did, but also for anyone, like my Mom, wanting to know exactly where we went and what did we see and also for those, like us, who find Jewish Heritage interesting and always want to learn more. Wishing us happy travels and wishing you interesting reading.