Hello From The Original Athens

Whew! Patrick and I have been busy these past few days: site-seeing, eating good foods, and swimming in the Mediterranean Sea.

Monday: Patrick and I did most of the major ancient sites today. We started off early at the Acropolis--we were so early the Acropolis wasn't open yet! We also learned that the Acropolis Museum is not open on Mondays (which the guide book did not tell us), but we waited around and climbed a small hill to admire the city. Luckily, the Acropolis was open and at 9 we could wander up. It was amazing. Everything was gorgeous--even with all of the construction equipment lying around (they are working on a major preservation effort). Patrick and I took tons of pictures and I geeked out and ran everywhere to look at all of the old rocks. After the Acropolis, Patrick and I headed to other sites that we could visit on our ticket (great deal!). We saw the Ancient Agora (marketplace), Hadrian's Library, Theatre of Dionysus, Temple of Hephaestus in the Agora, and Karameikos (an old grave yard that has some of the best sculptures found from the grave offerings) with its museum. We ate lunch while overlooking the Agora. In the late afternoon we put off two sites for Wednesday because it was siesta time and they were closed. We wandered through Plaka instead; Plaka is the touristy area of Athens where we tried some baklava. There, we were able to buy tickets for an island hopping cruise for Tuesday. We ate some gyros and gelato later in the evening before collapsing in our beds.

Tuesday: Today was the island hopping cruise day. Everyone whom I told that I was going to Athens asked if I was going to visit the Greek islands, I always replied no, but it turns out I got to visit three! The cruise was all day. The bus picked us up at 7 am and dropped us off at 9 pm. We were exhausted by that time. We visited Hydra, Paros, and Aegina. On Hydra, Patrick and I went swimming--it was cold! After Hydra, we got to eat lunch on the mini-cruise ship. We sat with retired couples from Valencia and Australia. I practiced my spanish which was very rusty. Then on Paros we just wandered around until we spotted lambs' heads roasting on spits. Patrick just had to try it. From the heads, you can eat the brain, eyes and tongues. I tried tongue and brain and Patrick ate all three. The tongue was actually tasty, but the brain was nasty. It tasted like the green stuff in crabs that you aren't supposed to eat--it was warm and mushy. They gave us fries with it which helped us cleanse our palate (those were the best fries Patrick and I have had in a while). Patrick said the eyeball was somewhere in-between the tongue and brain. After Paros, Patrick and I paid for the swimming tour excursion which took us to this island off of Aegina to swim. The little island had peacocks wandering around, goats, and deer. The deer came right up and waited until the weight staff put out some corn for them. The peacocks would just wander right by where you were sitting--amazing! After Aegina, we headed back the the hotel and grabbed some more gyro meat and pita in small restaurant near our hotel. I had sea legs the entire night though--everything kept swaying.

Wednesday: Today Patrick and I finished up site-seeing. We saw the Temple of Zeus and Hadrian's Arch. Then we spent more than two hours wandering around the brand new Acropolis Museum, which is lovely. After twelve, we started heading towards the beach. Patrick read about some nice beaches so we decided to try them. After an adventure of two hours we finally made it there. By 2:30 we were also ready for lunch; we ate lunch in the little restaurant at the resort. At 5, we left the beach and headed to a cafe to watch USA beat Algeria in football. It was very exciting because we won in the overtime. After the game, we headed back into Athens and towards Plaka so Patrick could buy a souvenir. Then, we headed to the hotel were we ate dinner Sunday night. We watched the Acropolis light up at night--beautiful! After that we headed back to the hotel to get ready for Rome tomorrow!