Explore Kalabaka

Meteora is a group of sandstone and conglomerate rock pillars between Kalabaka and Kastraki in Thessaly, on which Eastern Orthodox monks built 24 monasteries from the 14th century. Six survive, and the site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1988. Roads and footpaths link the viewpoints, and each monastery is visited on its own.

The Monastery of Saint Stephen is a Greek Orthodox convent at the south-eastern end of the Meteora rocks, directly above Kalabaka. Unlike the other monasteries, it is reached over a short bridge rather than by steps. Its main church, dedicated to Saint Charalambos, was built in 1798, and a community of nuns has lived here since 1961.

The Monastery of the Holy Trinity is a Greek Orthodox monastery on top of a rock pillar about 400 m high at Meteora, above Kalabaka. Its main church dates from 1475–76. Visitors climb some 140 steps cut into the rock in 1925, which replaced rope ladders and nets. The monastery appears in the 1981 James Bond film For Your Eyes Only.

The Monastery of Rousanou is a Greek Orthodox convent at Meteora whose buildings cover the whole top of a sheer rock pillar on the road from Kastraki. The brothers Ioasaph and Maximos from Ioannina rebuilt it around 1527–29; its church of the Transfiguration was painted with frescoes in 1560, and two bridges built in 1930 lead to the entrance.

The Monastery of Varlaam is a working Greek Orthodox monastery on a sandstone pillar at Meteora, above Kastraki and Kalabaka. The brothers Theophanes and Nektarios Apsaras from Ioannina resettled the rock in 1517; their church of All Saints, built in 1541–42, was painted with frescoes in 1548. It is part of the Meteora World Heritage Site.

The Great Meteoron Monastery, the Monastery of the Transfiguration of the Saviour, is one of the oldest of the Meteora monasteries and stands 613 m above sea level on a rock above the Pineios valley near Kalabaka. Athanasius the Meteorite founded it in 1356. Visitors reach it by steps cut into the rock and see its church with frescoes and the monastery's buildings.

Theopetra Cave is a limestone cave above the village of Theopetra, about 3 km south of Kalabaka, excavated since 1987. Its layers record people living here from the Middle Palaeolithic to the Neolithic, with footprints about 130,000 years old and a stone wall about 23,000 years old. The ticket also covers the Documentation and Education Centre in the village.