Nafplio

Nafplio was the first capital of modern Greece. In 1821, when they declared their independence from the Ottoman Empire, this is where the headquarters was set.

After they won their independence, they needed a king, so they went to all those European countries and said, "We need a king." They gave them Otto from Bavaria. He came here, went to all the Byzantine churches just like a Greek of the time, and stayed king for quite a while until it was apparent he couldn't have any children. Then they needed a new king.

So then they got a Danish king. I could look it up, but you could too.

The food here, as everywhere we visited in Greece, was fantastic. This was a beet carpaccio dish with prickly pear fruit, balsamic pearls, and little grains. Oh my gosh, it was so delicious.

There was a fort above the city. There were 999 steps to get up to the top of it. There used to be a thousand, but when Kapodistrias' horse stepped on the first one, he broke it, so then there were only 999. He was the first president of Greece and the hero of the Greek independence movement. He was assassinated by two ne'er-do-wells about two years after he took control of the country.

My history of this city is very jumbled, so you need to look it up yourself, or even better yet, come here and visit, eat the food, see the sites, walk the 999 steps, and take a look at what's going on.