Ancient Corinth Private Day Trip from Athens

Athens, Greece

Visit Ancient Corinth and the Corinth Canal.  The location of countless ancient myths, like the myth of Sisyphus and there were games like the Olympics held in the devotional area of Isthmia. Although the city was destroyed by earthquakes, you can still see the extensive ruins that testify to Corinth’s great prosperity, including the marble columns of the Temple of Apollo. It is also one of the places that Saint Paul visited and wrote letters to.

In this day tour from Athens, we will be going to the archaeological site ancient Corinth and the Corinth Canal.

The ancient city-state of Corinth was located on the narrow strip of land connecting the Peloponnese to mainland Greece, known as the Isthmus of Corinth. The site has a very long history, being inhabited for the first time in the Neolithic Period. In ancient times, the city grew wealthy due to this strategic location and its control of the transportation of ships from the Corinthian to the Saronic gulf and vice versa. It became one of the most important trading powers in ancient Greece, rivalling Athens and Thebes, and had an extensive network of colonies. As well as being in a strategic location, at the intersection between East and West, it was also on fertile soil and by 400 BC it had a population of 90,000 people. The location of countless ancient myths, like the myth of Sisyphus, there were also games similar to the Olympics held in the devotional area of Isthmia. The ancient city was destroyed by the Romans, who built a new city in its place. Saint Paul also visited Corinth and later wrote letters, which are included in the New Testament, to the Christian community there. You can still see the extensive ruins that testify to Corinth’s great prosperity and long history, including the marble columns of the Temple of Apollo. These were uncovered in 1896, by the American School of Classical Studies at Athens and the Greek Ministry of Culture.

As we cross the Isthmus we will stop to see the great feat of engineering that finally opened up the route between the Gulf of Corinth and the Saronic gulf - the Corinth Canal. It was finished in 1893, even though the idea already existed at least as far back as 602 BC! In ancient times, there was a stele there which was thought to have been erected by Theseus. On the side that faced the West it said "Here is Peloponnesus, not Ionia", and on the side facing the East it said "Here is not Peloponnesus, but Ionia".