"Georgio's Ioannina Page" a Ioannina Travel Page by Georgio

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Ioannina is the capital céty of Greece's most mountainy region, Epirus. It has about 50,000 inhabitants, built amphitheatricaly along the shores of picturesque lake Pamvotis (see photo).
The city with the..four(!) names [also known as Giannina, Giannena, Yannina or even...Janinna(!)] was during the 18th century one of the wealthiest cities in the Balkans, renowned for its silver-smiths, craftsmen and merchants....
It reached its apogee during the reign of Ali Pasha(1790-1830 circa).
Ali Pasha was an ambitious local ruler of Greek-Albanian background (His father was from Tepeleni, Albania and his mother from Konitsa, Greece). He grew up in power and strenght until his plans caused the same the Sultan of Constantinople to react. Ali's dreams of replacing Sultan as the head of the -already declining- Ottoman empire perished in a bloodshed in 1830 when the troops of the Sultan besieged Ioannina. Ali Pasha who was left alone (his troops deserted) in the islet of the lake assasinated and his head was brought as a trophy in the court of the Sultan of Constantinople!...
Strangely, the death of Ali Pasha brought a severe financial and cultural crisis in Ioannina that gradually afterwards declined. The deliberation and annexion of Ioannina into the new-born Greek state in 1912 further deteriorated the crisis....: It caused most of its inhabitants to relocate in more safer areas, in south Greece (Athens) or in the western countries (Europe, USA)...
During the last decades the city is passing through a new era of prosperity and new polulation coming from the mountainy villages of the surrounding area have given a new life in the city. Modern shops, restaurants and luxury hotels are built one after another, and the city has nothing to envy by its European counterparts....However, the frenzy and unplanned construction of faceless block of flats caused the city to loose much of its previous charms.... Luckily however the castle with its medieval quartier inside the walls has been left intact by and the same does the romantic "molos" the spacy street around the castle.
In some other sector I will give you more details of what to see and what to do during your visit here,