Mount Athos: A trip to “The Holiest Place on Earth”

KARYES, Greece – To travel is to accept. Lifestyles. Foods. Politics. But more than anything, religion.

If you are close minded about religion, stay home. You won’t survive. Others you meet won’t let you. To say your religion is the word of God and others are mere superstitions is a slap in the face as offensive as a racist epithet.

Traveling to 114 countries, I’ve been exposed to all religions and some of their holiest sites. The Hindus’ Batu Caves in Malaysia. The Muslims’ Blue Mosque in Istanbul. The Buddhists’ Angkor Wat in Cambodia. I live 2 ½ miles from the Vatican.

But of all the temples, mosques, churches and shrines I’ve entered, none compares to last week when I visited what is often called “The Holiest Place on Earth.”

Mount Athos in Greece.

Mount Athos is a collection of 20 isolated monasteries on a spectacularly beautiful, rocky, 130-square-mile peninsula hanging off the northeast coast of Greece. For nearly 1,000 years, Mount Athos has attracted Eastern Orthodox monks from all over the world to, according to their doctrine, “become closer to God every day.”

To accomplish this, Mount Athos’ demands include the following:

• Women and children are forbidden.
• No TV, newspapers, radio or Internet.
• Two meals a day, taken in silence, for 10 minutes each.
• Eight-hour services 365 days a year.

And nothing has changed in nearly 1,000 years. 

It is not even part of Greece. It’s designated as an autonomous region that the monastic community governs by ancient Byzantine law. The village of Karyes is its administrative center. This capital has all of 100 residents. Since 1988 Mount Athos has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

For me, this was far from a pilgrimage. I’m an atheist. For me to accept one god is to say all the other gods don’t exist. And I’m not telling 1.2 billion Hindus they’re wrong. Thus, I accept all faiths.

I came to Mount Athos on a rare invitation. It was courtesy of my Travelers’ Century Club, the organization of travelers who’ve been to at least 100 countries and territories. We had our biannual meeting in the Greek city of Thessaloniki and organized a trip to Mount Athos.

It’s not far from Thessaloniki. It’s just a two-hour drive and a 45-minute ferry ride down the coast. But Mount Athos is a galaxy away from the real world as we know it. Silence. Constant prayer. Two thousand monks in beards nearly as long as their black cloaks walking in silent meditation. 

But it’s also gorgeous, sparkling monasteries that could grace the cover of any architectural magazine resting on beautiful land only a god could create. On the 2,000-meter Mount Athos, Monks say there is no place in the world where one feels closer to heaven.

If it’s possible, I did indeed feel blessed. 

The journey

Thessaloniki is Greece’s second city. Five hundred kilometers (300 miles) north of Athens, Thessaloniki was once the second-most important city in Byzantium after Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul). Today, it is a major commercial, economic, industrial and political hub of 1 million people.

I hadn’t visited since 1978 when I hitchhiked through Greece and saw Thessaloniki as nothing but a concrete jungle full of banks, ugly retail shops and rain. Forty-seven years later, armed with more time, money and curiosity, I found it has a nice five-kilometer waterfront and some original Byzantine churches.

It is not much of a jumping off post for Mount Athos. The site only allows 110 permits a day – and only 10 for non-pilgrims. We were nine – minus the wives and girlfriends left back in Thessaloniki.

We all hopped in cars and drove two hours to the coastal village of Ouranoupoli. Its charming port is lined with seafood restaurants and cafes with tables pointing out to this part of the cold Aegean which looked much less inviting than the Aegean I know from the southern islands.

Although Mt. Athos’ isolation makes it mistaken for an island, it’s actually on one of three peninsulas sticking down from the Chalkidiki Peninsula. Ouranoupoli is the last settlement before the border of Mount Athos.

After a feast of souvlaki, soup and seafood and a good night’s sleep, we all gathered early the next morning at an administrative office where we received the equivalent of a Mount Athos passport stamp. A grim Greek official looking very un-monk-like took my passport and for the first time in my life, I was asked my religion. Fearing refusal or later thrown off the rocks into the sea, I chickened out and gave my family upbringing.

“Presbyterian,” I said. 

He handed me an official document with the Mount Athos stamp, a declaration in Greek and four signatures. I had my ticket to one of the most sacred places in Christianity.

The arrival

Seagulls shepherded our small ferry boat down the coast on a sunny, 55-degree day. Many young monks in long black robes fingered their prayer beads as we passed high green hills along the rocky coast. No beach was in sight.

The famed British author Robert Byron wrote a book about Mount Athos called “The Station” after his visit in 1928. He wrote of a similar approach that I had, “There, carried high on a bank of clouds, hovers a shape, a triangle in the sky. This is the Holy Mountain Athos, station of a faith where all the years have stopped.”

Yes, right behind the crude, simple dock just big enough for small ferries, with a backdrop of a foothill 400 feet high, stood this gargantuan building of white stone. Along the top was a series of windows on rooms of peach, red and turquoise. 

This was Xenophontos monastery. With two main churches, one built in the 10th century and another in 1817, it has 11 chapels inside and six outside. Stone walkways led to red, octagonal domes towering over red brick chapels. Domed gazebos were scattered around for quiet reflection.

Like all the monasteries, inside dripped with gold. Gold chandeliers, gold paintings, gold picture frames, gold frescoes. I was blinded by the bling. 

This is where three of our members would spend the night. Without TV. Without newspapers. Without radio. Without Internet. My cellphone was dead the minute I stepped foot on land.

The second monastery our boat stopped at stepped up in beauty. Moni Agiou Panteleimonos looks like a sultan’s palace. A string of beautiful stone and wooden structures line the high dock. Above them is a bright turquoise four-story church under six kelly green domes.

Founded in the 11th century by Russian monks, this is Mount Athos’ Russian monastery and houses only Russians although all monks on Mount Athos become Greek citizens.

As we walked the grounds, a spry, small man with a gray beard walked slowly, his hands behind his back. He paid us no mind. Neither did the monk in the stove-top hat, reading a Bible on the wall overlooking the sea.

I oddly didn’t feel like an intruder. As there were only nine of us and not a tour bus, we scattered and made ourselves less conspicuous. 

Good thing. One monk walked by with a dog, looking vicious with his jaw muzzled. 

A TCC member joked, “Someone said there was a Presbyterian on the island.”

Apparently, better a non-pilgrim than a woman.

Mount Athos history

According to legend, this religious site began when the Virgin Mary and Apostle John sailed to Cyprus and a storm blew them off course all the way to Mount Athos. So taken by the mountain’s raw beauty that she asked it to be her garden paradise and a haven for all those seeking salvation.

It was then christened as the garden of the Mother of God and out of bounds to all other women. No woman has touched foot on its soil reportedly for 1,000 years.

Mount Athos’ history is a little vague. Homer mentioned it in his Iliad and it’s believed monks have been here since the 4th century. The Roman emperors destroyed the churches during the Roman Empire, chasing the monks into the woods where they lived in straw huts.

But it wasn’t until Byzantine emperor Alexios Komnenos (1081-1118) gave Mount Athos complete autonomy and exemption from taxation when it established self-governance. Since then, monks have come from all over the Eastern Orthodox world, particularly former Soviet Republics but also as far away as the U.S. and East Asia.

Part of that self-governance is a ban on women, making Mount Athos the only habitation in the world with such a policy. Why? They say they’re a distraction, a distraction from God. 

Monks pray all day. Some have been known to recite the Lord’s Prayer even in their sleep. They grow their own fruits and vegetables on the lush mountain. They have a tailor who has the world’s dullest job: making and adjusting long black robes all day.  There is one doctor who has little to do.

Mount Athos reports almost no illness. Living in Italy, I couldn’t help noticing that the monks’ occasional intake of red wine may have helped.

This area is also highly secretive. It took 60 Minutes two years to get permission for a 15-minute report in 2011. An Italian video blogger got thrown off the mountain last year after monks researched him and found he’d done reports on ladyboys in Thailand, vaccines and even yoga.

Yet there I stood interviewing one of the monks.

Interview with a Monk Timothy

We were in Vatopedi, founded by Greek monks in the 10th century and now home to 110 monks. In one of its many small chapels dripping in gold, we all stood in line before a monk at a desk. I had no idea why. Like a kid on a  school outing, I didn’t want to miss something.

I noticed the monk was handing each person a small envelope. I reached the front of the line and he pointed to a ring on the table. He touched his lips. Feeling silly, I bent over and kissed the ring and he handed me a small cardboard envelope. Inside was a small roll of cloth.

According to legend, each cloth ribbon is blessed by the Holy Belt once worn by the Virgin Mary and has been in Vatopedi since the 14th century. It is her only relic remaining today.

A small booklet accompanying the ribbon is given only to devout pilgrims. Those who wear it have been known to be “cured of illnesses and sorrows, and childless couples are blessed with children.”

I thought they all look made in China.

Not risking being smote into ashes, I said nothing. Later in a small chapel a burly priest in a long gray beard and heavy glasses chatted with one of our members. We had no guide. They’re expensive. So we scurried for whatever information we could find.

He spoke excellent English. He gave his name as Timothy. Turns out, he’s from Tokyo and spent 7 ½ years in various churches in Alaska and Arizona. He had heard of my hometown of Eugene, Ore. He’d been at Vatopedi for nine years.

“I had a mentor (in Japan) who gave me a recommendation in silence and prayer,” he said. “I found Orthodox religion and learned more through reading.”

Then he got nervous.

“You’re taking notes,” he said.

“I just want to give people an idea of what motivates you,” I said. “What do you like about living here?”

He went on.

“I have to lighten a burden,” he said. “You have to endure difficulties. Because mine are lighter than people in the world, they can overcome them peacefully by me consoling all visitors.”

“You should console me a lot,” I said. “I’m an American.”

And now for the rest of my life, I can honestly say I made an Eastern Orthodox monk howl with laughter.

All Donald Trump jokes aside, I left Mount Athos feeling no more touched by anything divine than when I arrived. But I did come away with a respect for a group of holy men so intensely dedicated to their beliefs that they find happiness and fulfillment in the humblest of lifestyle.

Of course, it’s easy to be happy on a mountain surrounded by beautiful buildings overlooking the Aegean Sea. But as I always say when I leave mosques, temples and cathedrals …

… who am I to judge?

If you’re thinking of going …

How to get there: The lone public transportation is a 2-hour, 35-minute Ammon Express bus (info@ammonexpress.gr) that leaves Thessaloniki four times a week for Ouranoupoli. Price is €50 one way. It’s best to rent a car in Thessaloniki and drive two hours to Ouranoupoli. Cars rent for as low as €14 a day.

How to go there: Pilgrimages from one to four days can be organized through https://athos.guide. 

Where to stay: Xenios Zeus Hotel, Ouranoupoli, 30-2377-071-274,

https://www.xenioszeus-ouranoupoli.gr/en/contact, zeus@ouranoupoli.com. Excellent two-star hotel on the village’s main drag about 50 meters from the port. I paid €67 for one night.

Where to eat: Restaurant Lemoniadis, 30-2377-071-355, 9 a.m.-1 a.m. Sprawling restaurant on Ouranoupoli’s port serves all classic Greek dishes in a festive atmosphere. Excellent soups.

For more information: Visit Mount Athos, https://www.visitmountathos.eu/getting-there.html.