Blog Update: Athens Greece

We have now been in Athens for two weeks of rapid exploration (time flies when you’re having fun). I will, as always, try to bring you our readers along for the journey. Please look at the gallery photos and you will have a better idea of what is being talked about. As usual we booked our Airbnb apartment while still in Cyprus. We had communications with our new hosts but you never know what to expect until you get there. Our hosts Eviana and Chrysa picked us up at the airport (free of charge!). They spoke English and on the 45 minute ride to our new home we had free wheeling discussion of all things Greek as well as what our travels had been. After they showed us our apartment we were left to get settled and get some much needed sleep. The next morning we woke refreshed (nice bed, not always the case) and were ready to get out and orient ourselves to Athens. Eviana and Chrysa told us to walk down our main road for 30 minutes and we would be at the Acropolis (Parthenon). Sometimes when we are told such things 30 minutes turns into two hours, but in twenty the Acropolis came into view, it was breathtaking. We sat at an open air cafe and had breakfast while gazing at the view and watching all the people walk past us. After breakfast we walked for probably for at least four hours getting our bearings, sight seeing, and making plans for our explorations. In the “Plaka” area (below the Acropolis) is a beehive warren of little streets with little cafes, trinket shops, Greek and Roman ruins everywhere you walk, it is overwhelming. As we often do, we jumped on a tourist “hop on, hop off bus” to get the big picture of the town. The next day we headed up to the Acropolis. What can I tell you to help put you there? First I guess is that the Acropolis is on a mountaintop in the center of Athens and has been there for over 3 thousand years! An earlier people were already using the Acropolis site before Greeks which dates back to about 1200 BC. It’s amazing that anything is left after all that time. The Parthenon and Temple of Athena (namesake of the city) dates back to 450 BC. Much restoration has been done here but much of the Parthenon is original. There are several buildings at the top as well as two theatres. The main use of the site was to house the treasury of Greece and devotion to the Greek Goddess Athena. A statue of her that was 30 foot tall once stood in the Parthenon. The next day we set out to figure out how to use the public transportation system. We found a modern mall and learned to use the subway to get around the city quickly. While there we did our first virtual 9D experience. It was a good thing we chose an easy ride cuz both of us were a little queasy afterwards. We took a day off to chill and then the next day went out to the beach on the tram which gave us great views of the country side and down the coast. We noticed that lots of the beach resorts and or restaurants were closed and out of business. We have seen these in the City as well, left over financial devastation as a result of the global depression of 2009. Greece was probably hit harder then anywhere else in Europe, it is still trying to dig out of heavy debt even after a European bail out. The people here are very friendly, English is spoken by about 30 percent of those we meet, which makes it pretty easy to get around. We took the subway out to a little town we had heard about. We were not sure why people thought we should go there but we figured we would check it out. To our surprise it was much different from Athens. In the park they were having a flower exposition so we strolled through flowers and had a nice lunch on a sunny day. We then took off walking not knowing where we were headed. Again some of our best “finds” are accidental, we ended up walking right in the middle of town with huge old mansions along tree covered streets. Some which looked to be more like castles. This, as it turns out, is the home of many old wealthy families of Athens. After taking another day off we had heard about another site to check out call the “Ancient Agora”. Agora meaning town square or market and it was the center of Athens even before the Parthenon was built, dating to over 500 BC. Twenty acres of ruins, some restored, some left in ruins, some original and intact. The standout being the Temple of Hephaestus, the oldest still standing Greek Temple, dating to 500BC, predating the Parthenon. It was at the steps of this building that Socrates, Alexander the great, Plato and Aristotle discussed the politics and philosophy of the day. This site was a day in itself. We have spent some days just wandering around the historic parts of the city and ventured into some of the local neighborhoods, unfortunately we either dropped my wallet or were pick pocketed in the subway. We always leave a couple spare credit cards in our room so we were able to replace the cash, but lost our drivers licenses and two bank cards. After a day of banking roulette we had our affairs together again. Our next “expedition” was taking the train out to historic Corinth or Korinthos in Greek. Famous for being the place that the disciple Paul spent two years preaching the Good News of a new religion and then writing two books in the bible to the church that he had started there. We walked where Paul had walked and stood in the same spot he stood when he first made the case for Christ to the powerful rulers. Not unexpectedly his message was rejected, but they felt he had not broken Roman law so decided not to kill him. Later he found some converts and the new church in Europe was planted. We visited the historic site of Mycenae (home to the pre-Greek Mycenaean king and kingdom in which the famous Sparta was located. This site dated to 1200 BC with some evidence of occupations dating as far back as 3000 BC. We were staying in a little B&B that was reasonable ($51) a night including breakfast. Very nice place and the owners found us a cab to drive us up to a 12th century Frankish castle on top of the mountain along with the trip to Mycenae and took us to see the famous canal of Corinth. The canal was dug in the 1800’s allowing ships to cross the isthmus and avoid the treacherous seas going around the southern tip of the peninsula. Before this time people had been dragging boats (ships) across the 10 mile isthmus on wooden rollers since 600 BC! The temple of Apollo is the oldest Temple in Corinth and dates back to 600 BC. We spent a couple days exploring Corinth and then took a couple days off planning our trip to Egypt. We met our hosts before we left for drinks and a meal, they showed us a little of the nightlife and interesting places. Wonderful hosts! We will post a special blog entry after returning from our Egypt trip and the will be staying another two weeks in Greece before heading out for Italy. Stay turned for more “Chrysalis Adventures”