High above the Meteora landscape in the central region of Greece, 60 monks and nuns live in fabled monasteries perched on the edge of sandstone peaks. In centuries past, their place of worship brought ...

The monasteries of Meteora in Thessaly are perched atop mighty rock formations; the backdrop starred as a location in Game of Thrones - Paul Williams /Alamy After a lengthy drive along traffic-jammed ...

The karst rises from the flatland as if escaping the underworld, violently forced up by something down there. The truth is the opposite. The stark, imposing rocks are what's left after millions of ...

Fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight . . . I have to stop to catch my breath. With fifty-eight stairs behind me, I have yet to face another 137 to reach my final target: the holy monastery of Varlaam, ...

This story appears in the March 2020 issue of National Geographic magazine. The monasteries of Meteora, Greece, are marvels of engineering. Perched atop sandstone cliffs, with monastic cells hidden in ...

The Great Meteoron Monastery: The region's largest and oldest monastery is the Great Meteoron. Meteora means "suspended in the air" and this place of worship gave its name to the entire region.