By Kendra Frey
Our second concert, at the Patras Music School on Monday, was a tiny, huge event. The space was tiny. The crowd was huge. After setting up the stage and all of our equipment, we all settled down into our seats and realized that while we all had very little room, there was even less space left for the audience. We had a short sound-check, and then people started filing in to see us play. The 11 or 12 benches were quickly filled with students, standing spaces were filled with more students and teachers, and yet the audience continued to come into the room. By the time we began to play, people were lining up on the staircase to have a chance to see us, and many could not get into the building, but stood outside and watched us through the windows. We were worried about the space at first, but being packed so closely made the audience’s excitement obvious to us and made us all more excited to perform. The concert was great! After we finished playing, two ensembles from the school performed for us. Most of us had never heard a mandolin orchestra before, and they were awesome!
We all enjoyed Patras, and we were sad to leave this morning, but we were able to see so many amazing things today! After seeing a beautiful sunrise over the Ionian Sea and some impressive mountains, we arrived in Delphi. We had a chance to take a quick look in the archaeological museum, and then we went to the archaeological site, where we walked up the mountain past the ancient temple, theater, and stadium. The ruins were incredible to see (yet another incomprehensibly old and beautiful historical site!) and the enormous mountains, deep valley, pine trees, and blue sky made the experience even better.
After soaking up the scenery, we got back on the buses and continued on to Meteora. We saw the amazing Meteora rocks and the monasteries perched on top of them, took tons of pictures during several short photo stops, and a brave few ventured out onto one of the cliffs for better views of the surroundings and some solid gold selfies.
We just finished our delicious dinner at the hotel in Kalambaka, and we’re preparing for another early morning tomorrow—to Volos we go!
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