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The history of the Meteora rocks

METEORA, an “art of Nature”, is a rocky forest, designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. In 1995 the Hellenic government declared it a “sacred area”, belonging to all and protected from any change or interference. The huge rocks were formed millions of years ago, from a mixture of sand, stones, pebbles and hard gravel, when the three rivers that came to the lake, brought all kinds of raw materials. The petrified pillars of METEORA are extraordinary, with horizontal stripes and strange shapes, reaching 600 m tall. What makes them even more remarkable are the exquisite monasteries, built by hermits during the 9th c. AD, at the pinnacles of the rocks. For centuries these towers of sandstone provided cliff-top retreat for the monks.

Sit at the edge of one of these massive rocks, and let your mind travel millions of years back, when the big lake covered the whole valley. As a result of a very strong earthquake, the water went into the Aegean Sea, and the lake dried out, recovering all this natural beauty that you see in front of you today. This is the most probable explanation of how all these rocks were formed. You will confront a geological phenomenon which is universally unique, where words like, “admire, unexplainable, impressive” describe its size, only to a point.