PToday we left Meteora and we are spending most of the day on the bus traveling to Arakova. However, we had several stops along the way. The first place we stopped is a place that makes icons. 
There seem to be about four artists and they are officially licensed icon painters. 
They have a nice shop and obviously they do sell small icons to tourists. 
However they also have sold icons to the Vatican, and they even have a picture of presenting one to Pope John Paul. They were so beautiful I was seriously tempted to buy one, but then I thought about the fact that I already have two Russian ones that are sitting inside a drawer and that's where this one would have ended up as well. After that we have a situation stop, which is what we call a pee break, roadside kind of place where regular buses, not tourist buses, stop as well.
Then we had a stop at Thermoplae, the site of an ancient battle which has a little memorial of sorts. 
This is where 3000 Spsrtans and 7000 Thespians (soldiers from Thespa, not actors) died. This might have been 300 and 700 (since I'm always quite hazy on numbers). I think she told us that there were some recent findings that suggested this was the actual site of this battle. One final lunch stop on the Ionian Sea where we had some wonderful calamari and Greek salad with our New York friends Michelle and Sheila. 
I finally got a picture of one of these little roadside shrines they have all over here when we stopped to look at the largest olive grove in Greece. 
When we arrived at our hotel and had a cooking class where we learned how to make moussaka, tzoureki, and spanikopita. 
We had yet another ouzo tasting tonight. I've had so much I'm starting to like the stuff.
Tomorrow we go see the oracle of Delphi and get our fortunes told. 
View from our balcony.
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