Spring is here, even if the weather continues to do its tricks. The cold has receded and the chill does not deter the nature that turns green and blooms for a unique purpose. To donate itd gifts, its colorful and fragrant flowers on the great spring festival of Christianity, Easter.
Lefkada is one of the classic Easter destinations. Both the easy access to the island, as well as the special customs and habits of the celebration, are an incentive for someone to spend the holy days of Easter there and an occasion for those Lefkadians who live outside the island to visit it.
Holy Friday in the city of Lefkada with the epitaphs of all the parishes roaming the streets and the market of the city, the emotionally charged melodies of the philharmonic in the central square, the custom “Kommati” on the Holy Saturday morning in the central market, almost monopolize the interest of visitors.
The Holy Week is flowing quietly.
The customs, here, acquire meaning, smell, color.
On Holy Thursday, fresh eggs are boiled and dyed in the classic color, red.
The scents of nature are strong and you feel that it is participating too in the Divine Drama. The gardens full of flowers, the meadows as well, offer their beauty for the decoration of the epitaphs in the villages. Girls and women collect them and start decorating it at dawn on Holy Friday. A walk in the villages in the morning of this day for a pilgrimage to the epitaphs, is the most beautiful thing you can do. As every village has a different time that carries out the circumambulation of the epitaphs, gives you the opportunity to watch two or three circumambulations and feel that you are living the Divine Drama over and over again.
You will certainly spend Saturday morning in the city with the clay vessels breaking at the feet of the musicians of the Philharmonic, in the “piece” preparing the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but make sure that in the evening you find yourself in a monastery to light your candle with the Divine Light. Prefer the Red Church, next to the forest of Skaros, and you will hear the melodies of the angels mixing with the whispers of the centuries-old oaks. Or the monastery of Agios Ioannis in Livadi of Karya, a historic monastery, around which the mountains of the island enclose the miracle of the Resurrection and you can feel it strongly stirring your soul.
You can go even further, on the edge of the island, in the south, to the monastery of Agios Nikolaos, two steps from the cape of Nira, a holy place since ancient times.
Experience Easter in Lefkada and you will always ask for it, especially if you get your own property.