Day 08 - Travel Day to Greece!

Hi, friends and family. Thanks for following our trip so far. Today was a long travel day. We left our hotel in Turkey at 12:30 am and drove to the airport. A quick flight brought us back to Istanbul and another flight had us in Greece by 9 am. We took some time to rest until mid-afternoon and then enjoyed experiencing some of the sites and food in the city of Thessaloniki. We spent time discussing the letters to the Thessalonians and how Paul journeys through this area. Sorry, this blog is short but enjoy the photos while we rest up and prepare for our last few days on the trip. Tomorrow our plan is to see more of Thessaloniki as well as Philippi.

Some interesting facts about Thessaloniki:

The city was founded in 315 BC by Cassander of Macedon and was named after his wife Thessalonike, daughter of Philip II of Macedon and sister of Alexander the Great.

It is also known in Greek as η Συμπρωτεύουσα (i Simprotévousa), literally "the co-capital", a reference to its historical status as the Συμβασιλεύουσα (Simvasilévousa) or "co-reigning" city of the Byzantine Empire alongside Constantinople (Istanbul).

It is Greece’s second major economic, industrial, commercial and political center; it is a major transportation hub for Greece and southeastern Europe, notably through the Port of Thessaloniki. The city is renowned for its festivals, events and vibrant cultural life in general, and is considered to be Greece's cultural capital.

At the time of the Roman Empire, about 50 A.D., Thessaloniki was also one of the early centers of Christianity; while on his second missionary journey, Paul the Apostle visited this city's chief synagogue on three Sabbaths and sowed the seeds for Thessaloniki's first Christian church. Later, Paul wrote two letters to the new church at Thessaloniki, preserved in the Biblical canon as First and Second Thessalonians.