Lavara

Lavara, (Greek: Λάβαρα) is a town licated in the eastern part of the prefecture of Evros. It is the seat of the municipality of Orfeas (Greek: Ορφέας). It is located only nearly 2 km from Turkey and the western banks of the Evros. The nearest Turkish settlement is Alibey. Orfeas is one of the largest municipality and the leastly populated municipality in the prefecture. Much of the land are mountainous and forested to the west hovering the central and the western part of the prefecture extending up to the Rhodope prefecture. It is linked with GR-51 (Alexandroupoli - Orestiada - Edirne in Turkey and Svilengrad in Bulgaria). The town sits on a plain. It is located SE of Svilengrad, S of Edirne, Turkey and Orestiada, and 13 km N of Soufli and 78 km N of Alexandroupoli.

Lavara, School and Church,

Communities

• Amorio
  
• Kyriaki
  
• Mandra
  
• Mavroklisiou
  
• Mikro Denio
  
• Protoklisiou
  

Nearest places

• Didymoteicho, NE
  
• Kissari, east
  
• Mandra, west
  

Historical population

Geography

Forests dominates the banks and parts of the plain. Much of the area are used for farming. The main production are cattle, fruits and vegetables and some flowers. The mountains dominate further west.

History

The town were rare affected by the Evros river flooding of February 17 to 22, 2005. Flood warnings were reported that time. It devastated much of the town on Wednesday March 2, 2005 and continued for several days. On Friday March 4, flood waters plummeted slowly. It amounted up to 5 m or 5,000 mm of rainfall causing the rover to overflow its banks. It flooded buildings, properties and stores. It also left people stranded in their homes and buildings. 50 houses were damaged. It was the worst flooding in nearly 50 years. The rail south of Lavara and near the station were also flooded and was closed that time.

Other

Lavara has a school, a lyceum, a gymnasium, churches, banks, a police station, a water tower, a post office, a library, and a square (plateia).

References