Athens (without a map)

This weekend was pretty epic. I spent 3 days in Athens, Greece. The first day we went on a walking tour and got to know the area, after which we wandered around without a map. That was pretty awesome because we did, in fact, find our way around (it's easy when there's a mountain with the Parthenon on top of it to use as a landmark), and by the end of the trip we were experts on walking to the Plaka and back.

The second day we saw everything. We got passes to all of the Acropolis, which is the site of all the major ruins. It was completely surreal (not to mention it was about 85 degrees with nary a cloud in the sky, in the middle of October). Anyway, we walked up to the temples, like the Temple of Hephaestus (the god of fire and metalwork), the Temple of Zeus, the Erechtheum, and of course the Parthenon. We also walked around the ruins of the ancient agora (marketplace), the ancient Theatre of Dionysus, an ancient library called Hadrian's Library, and the ancient cemetery of Kerameikos. So, we pretty much saw a lot of ancient stuff.

The ruins were amazing, and I can't describe how cool it was to stand in front of the Parthenon (even with all the scaffolding). After walking and sweating and walking some more, we went to the Plaka, which is the big market area with tons of shops. We also climbed this big rock that had a great view overlooking Athens. On the trip, I dined on gyros, greek pizza, chicken souvlaki (which is pretty much just grilled chicken kabobs), saganaki, and greek pastries. All of the pastries were absolutely swimming in honey, which might sound pretty tasty at first, but might also make you want to vomit if you eat more than two bites.


All in all, Greece was quite an adventure. I'd heard from various people before going that Athens was dirty and not that great, and that you should go to the Greek islands instead. I disagree. I thought Athens was fantastic, and while you can basically see everything in the course of one day, it's so worth it to go. But I'll let you be the judge of that after looking at some of the pictures I took.



The view from the rock we climbed




Erechtheum

Temple of Hephaestus

Temple of Zeus

And, of course, the Parthenon! Unfortunately, the other side is completely covered in scaffolding.

Next weekend: crepes, berets, and people who hate Americans (but sadly no catacombs because people are stupid and vandals are even stupider).