The parliament in a village school

In March 1944 the resistance set up a governing body for the parts of Greece it controlled, at the village of Viniani. It became known as the government of the mountain.

Elections followed in April, held in secret and under occupation, and more than a million people voted. They were the first elections in Greece in which women could vote.

The assembly they elected met at Koryschades, five kilometres from Karpenisi, from 14 to 27 May 1944, in the village primary school. Around a hundred and seventy delegates reached the village, some of them walking for twenty days to get there, and three of them were women. Their first resolution declared that all power comes from the people.

The school is now the National Resistance Museum. The assembly hall is kept as it was, with the desk the delegates spoke from. Entry is free.

Proussos

Thirty kilometres south of Karpenisi, the Monastery of Proussos is built into a vertical cliff between two mountains, above a gorge.

It takes its name from the icon it holds, said to have come from Prousa in Asia Minor during the iconoclast persecutions of the ninth century, and known across central Greece as the Lady of Roumeli. Tradition dates the monastery to 829; historians think somewhere between the twelfth and fourteenth centuries is more likely.

During the Ottoman period it sheltered civilians, and during the war of independence it sheltered fighters. Georgios Karaiskakis was nursed back to health here and left his general's insignia as an offering; his weapons are still in the monastery treasury. Two watchtowers he built stand on the slope above.

German troops burned much of the monastery in August 1944, but the icon and the treasures had been hidden in a crypt. Frescoes of the thirteenth and sixteenth centuries survive, and there is a small museum.

Karpenisi, 1823

At Kefalovryso, near Karpenisi, a monument marks the night attack of August 1823 in which Markos Botsaris was killed. He was one of the leading commanders of the revolution, and his death at the age of thirty-six was mourned across Europe.

Karpenisi sits at about 960 metres below Velouchi and is the only town in the region. It has the practical things — hotels, tavernas, shops selling honey and cheese — and two museums worth an hour each: a mountain museum covering the history of climbing and skiing in Greece, and an interactive centre on the history of Evrytania.

Koryschades, at 940 metres, is a listed traditional settlement and the best preserved in the region: stone houses with overhanging upper floors and wooden balconies, a paved square under an enormous plane tree, and a church of 1865. Above it are the remains of an early Christian fort.

Megalo Chorio and Mikro Chorio face each other across the Karpenisiotis valley, five and ten kilometres from town, both built up their slopes in stone.

Gavros, in the valley below, is where the tavernas are, and Proussos is the village beside the monastery, at the end of a long mountain road.

The mountains

Mount Velouchi, also called Tymfristos, rises directly above Karpenisi and is the defining feature of the region. West of it stand the Agrafa, part of the Pindus range and among the least populated mountains in Greece. To the south are Chelidona, Kaliakouda and the Panaitoliko range.

All of them are covered in Greek fir, which is why Evrytania looks green from every direction.

The gorges

Panta Vrehi — the name means it always rains — is the best known. A series of waterfalls falls continuously down the rock walls, so the air inside the gorge stays wet whatever the weather. Getting to it is not simple: the last stretch needs a rough track or a walk.

Near Proussos, the Mavri Spilia gorge starts at a stone fountain by a bridge and passes three small waterfalls and a wooden footbridge before reaching a fall of about ten metres with a pool beneath it.

The rivers and the lake

The Karpenisiotis and the Krikelopotamos meet at a place called Dipotama and become the Trikeriotis, which runs down to the lake. The Tavropos, also called the Megdovas, drains the eastern side, and the Acheloos forms the western boundary.

All of them end in Lake Kremasta, the largest artificial lake in Greece, made in the 1960s behind a hydroelectric dam. It is about fifty-five kilometres from Karpenisi, and two long bridges cross it — at Episkopi and at Tatarna. The water is blue-green and the fir forest comes down to it on all sides.

Skiing

The Velouchi ski centre is about twelve kilometres from Karpenisi, at 1,840 metres, at a place called Diavolotopos. It has around eighteen runs, a snowboard slope and some off-piste routes, and a modern chalet at the top with a view over the whole range.

It was the first ski centre to open in Greece.

On the water and on foot

Rafting and kayaking run on the Tavropos and the Trikeriotis, with routes graded for beginners and for experienced paddlers, and operators based around Karpenisi.

The E4 European long-distance path crosses Evrytania, and there is a marked network of shorter routes around the Karpenisiotis valley linking the villages. The gorges are the other walking, and the rock around Panta Vrehi is used for climbing.

Evrytania eats what a mountain region eats. Lamb and goat are roasted whole or cooked slowly, wild boar appears on menus in winter, and the pies are made with pastry rolled by hand.

Mushrooms and chestnuts come out of the fir forests in autumn and turn up in everything. The cheeses are made locally from sheep and goat milk, and the honey is the region's best-known product, gathered from fir and from mountain herbs.

The drink is tsipouro, and the region also makes a small amount of wine.