I visited Mt. Athos two times in the past four months. My first visit was planed and I went with a larger group of my countryman. Ladies stayed in Jerisos and the men went on to Chilandaris. The whole experience for me was amazing. While waiting for the ferry one can hear many different languages and get first gimps of Mt. Athos by noticing many monks hading towards one of the monasteries. By little details in their robes and gear you can tell if they belong to Greek, Serbian, Romanian or some other Orthodox church. All this is taking place under huge Byzantine tower. The village of Ouranopolis has all the tourist could need but still you can feel “something different” close by.

The ferry ride was also interesting since we could see shores of Mt. Athos and also there were these sigils that followed the ferry and were eating from the peoples hands while making almost complete stops in the mid air!

We arrived to the little port which belongs to the Bulgarian monastery (I think) were a mini van waited for us. It took us on the dirt road for some 30 minutes and we could see Chilandaris from the distance. The monastery is on the foot of the mountains and it is few kilometers away from the coast on the opposite side from where we landed. First that I noticed were remains of the fire that happened in the monetary few years back. It was much worst than what I was expecting. Also visible were two cranes working on rebuilding the monastery. We were greeted by a monk who told us about daily routine, we were offered Greek coffee, Turkish delight and water. We were than given rooms in the guest house which is outside monastery walls, the rooms were simple but the whole building was very nice. Several of us took a walk around the monastery and up to the see. We saw several interesting places like giant guard tower build by one of the Serbian kings, several road chapels and another spots that are very interesting to our history.

I am not the artistic type, but the colors and the nature all around us was amazing.

I like history and was astonished by the details that were all around us. For example there was an original crest from one of our famous kings, king Lazar who died in Kosovo battle some 600 yrs ago.

But the spiritual experience was even more impressing. Monks did not talk too much, just a few simple words if they had to. They were going on their daily business and it was like we don’t exist. Except for few monks who did spent some time talking to us. But that silence was more than any conversation in my case. During the prayer that started at 3:30 am and lasted to almost 8 am the whole reason that this place existed was more than obvious. 800 hundred years of constant prayer, prayer for the entire world! I noticed steps into the church which were large marble stones with caving in the middle made by centuries of people walking in and out from the prayer. For me this whole experience was so impressive that I could write a book.

My second visit to Mt. Athos was totally unplanned. I was on vacation with my family on Holiday when I ran into a college friend of mine who helped me and another friend get visa (in short time) for a Russian monastery of St. Panteleimon. I was very happy to go back to Athos.

St. Pantheleimon is further than my last visit so I got to see several other monasteries. This monastery is huge and as a reply to the previous message it is very much alive today. There were over fifty monks of all ages, but mostly younger. There were cranes and many workers rebuilding the whole place. This visit was also very impressive and with many stories.

For the two days that I was there it was very memorable!

Another interesting thing is that during both of these visits I met many different people and impression that this monastic community left on them was also visible.