ASIANOVERLAND.NET KATHMANDU TO LONDON  DAY 154/66: KAVALA, GREECE

 22 November, 1980

Kavala is one of the nicest European stopovers in summer - swimming in the Aegean Sea, sunbaking and a ferry trip to the nearby Greek island of Thasos. However, it isn’t a great winter destination, apart from the wonderful Greek food (remarkably like their Turkish counterparts except with Greek/Tyurkish names and an age-old rivalry), ouzo (Raki), wine, (retsina of course), and the Kavala Fort.

Kavala was founded in the late 7th century BC by settlers from Thasos, founded to take advantage of rich gold and silver mines.

In the 6th century, Byzantine emperor Justinian I, fortified the city to protect it from barbarian raids. In later Byzantine times the city was called "Christo(u)polis" ("city of Christ") and belonged initially to Macedonia.

n the 8th and 9th centuries, Bulgarian attacks forced the Byzantines to reorganise the defence of Christoupolis with fortifications and a garrison.

In the 12th century the Arab geographer Edrisi visited Christoupolis and described it as a well fortified city and a centre of sea trade, but the Norman Crusaders burnt the city in 1185, after they captured Thessaloniki. Later, the city fell to the hands of the Lombards during the Fourth Crusades.

The Ottoman Turks first captured the city in 1387. Kavala was part of the Ottoman Empire from 1387 to 1912.

Mehmet Ali, the founder of a dynasty that ruled Egypt, was born in Kavala in 1769, and his house has been preserved as a museum.

Kavala was captured by the Greece during the Second Balkan War and incorporated into Greece with the treaty of Bucharest. In August 1916, a military revolt in Thessaloniki, led to the establishment of the Provisional Government of National Defence, and Greece's entry into the First World War after being promised Thrace and Smyrna (Izmir) by the British.

After the Greco-Turkish War of 1919–1922, Kavala entered a new era of prosperity because of the labor offered by thousands of refugees who moved from Turlkey/Asia Minor.

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