Folkore Museums & Local Community of Syrrako

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Mountain tourism aficionados love Syrrako and Kalarites. These two villages of North Tzoumerka combine stone houses and unique natural surroundings with grazing fields. Syrrako is impressive due to its architecture. All houses are built using white and black schist from this mountainous local region, worked with excellent craftsmanship. Wandering through the village visitors can also see the well-preserved threshing floors and local inhabitants’ sheds. The entire historic village was rebuilt by residents, mostly emigrants, or their descendants and it is presented like a period cinema set. Equally impressive are the slopes of the Arachthos river slopes, steeply reaching the riverbed. These natural formations led locals to cultivate fields on terraces. The dry walls on mountain slopes hold the earth on these small farming land lots wherever there are hamlets at a high altitude. Terraces are an integral part of the identity of such sites, particularly interesting from the viewpoint of cultural ecology.

Village residents usually live on site in the spring and summer. In the winter there are few inhabitants who maintain welcoming taverns near the church of St. Nicolas.

Syrrako has two folk museums. The home of poet and novelist Kostas Krystallis, which has become a folk museum and library and preserves all the household items and equipment of its time, as well as poet’s memorabilia. It also holds authentic cheese-making and weaving equipment. The mansion of Ermineia Photiadou has also been turned into a folk museum, exhibiting 150-year-old valuable items. It is a genuine home of the era when commerce and animal husbandry flourished in the locality. The museum presents exhibits of furniture, needlework and embroidery, woven items, folk costumes, household utensils and photographs.

Admission to Kostas Krystallis and Ermineia Photiadou Museums is free. For information about the museums, please, call: +30-26510-38490.