Meeting friends in Athens

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Thursday 16th September 2010

Ian & Jen sms'd us that they had arrived in Athens, and we arranged for them to meet us at the metro station near our hotel, The Zinon. This meant we were in no danger of getting lost on the way to the hotel!

We arrived at 6pm and they were there, giving us all the information they had collected prior and since arriving. A quick shower after unpacking, getting into shorts and warm weather clothes for the first time in a while, and we were off on Ian's guided tour.

It was interesting to be here again, our first visit was in 2002, many of the sights we saw were both similar and very different to then. The area we are in is very old and unkempt with much graffiti. Maybe the Olympics held here has influenced other aspects with many tourist type shops around, and a large number of restaurants obviously catering for the tourist. We did notice that there weren't as many tourists around as one would expect, this reflecting the problems the Greece economy is having and the timing as it is late in the season.

A pleasant dinner was had in a street off the main square, this very obviously a tourist venue but enjoyable all the same as we were enjoying the company of our friends from home.

On our return to the Zinon Hotel, set in a rather seedy part of town but very pleasant as well, we retired to our rooms to relax, catch up with the blog and for Judy her OUA work.

Tomorrow after breakfast we're going to the harbour to provision the yacht and have it ready for the other 2 couples when they arrive Saturday. We are fortunate that we can get the yacht earlier than expected if we take it from Alimos, a large marina not far from Athens. This has worked out perfectly as we hadn't booked anywhere for the night and thought we would need to travel further to Lavrion, much further from Athens.

Friday 17th September 2010

We spent the first part of the day wandering through the local market, the meat market and fish market most interesting with large displays of produce on display. As we didn't know what refrigeration we had on board we couldn't buy anything, unfortunately, as the prices compared cheaply to home. We did get a good supply of fruit and vegies but still not as much as we would have liked because we had to cart it the 9kms to the Alimos Marina.

Returning to the hotel, Judy spotted a telecommunications store right next door with usb modems in the window so Rags left her there to see what she could organise. She was back in a few minutes to get her laptop. she had promised to buy a Cosmote usb modem and the chap in the store had said he would help load it and make sure it was working. She was there for quite a while installing it, luckily some of the instructions could be had in English. There did seem to be a little hiccup at the end when he said it was working but would only access the Cosmote site, but he made a phone call and next thing it was working!


By the time Judy returned to the hotel Dunno and Jen were in the foyer with the luggage and she had just enough time to nip into the ladies before the taxi arrived! The taxi driver was not impressed with the load of belongings and bags of supplies but we somehow squeezed in. The boat was almost ready when we found it, we were happy with the size of it. The yacht had 4 berths, each with its own toilet/shower, the beds were compact but ok. As we were there first we had first choice, taking the forward cabin which adjoined a single cabin in the bow. This gave us more storage space and somewhere to put our bags, the others only having gear for the sailing section and we carrying clothes for the river cruise and later in Turkey.

At a supermarket, about a kilometre away, we bought what we thought would be essentials for a couple of days, with 8 people on board this being quite a lot of food which we had to lug back to the boat in the heat. Ian & Rags had to go back another time to cart back a load of drinks and some ice to cool it down. There is a fridge for food, a separate section for cooling where we added the ice, plus a cool box on the deck.

Ian cooked a pasta dish for us that evening, enjoyed whilst gently rocking in the harbour. When we retired for the night we did find it difficult to get to sleep with a disco band playing just across the water at high volume. Rags reckons he got no more than 3 hours sleep during the night. Jan & Kev arrived at about 1am having come in by plane from Santorini.

Saturday 18th September 2010

Lyn and Brian arrived at 7.30am, having spent the night at an hotel near the airport, we then revisited the supermarket for a final top-up of supplies. All returning with a load - we most probably have way to much but time will tell!

We were soon underway and heading out of Alimos under motor. We wanted to put up the sails when we cleared the harbour but soon discovered that with no apparent wind sailing was out of the question. We did put them up for a while and floated around the ocean for a while before deciding we had too far to go and turning the motor on once again.

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Photos

Marionnettes for sale
We love to bring these home for the grandkids but already feel that we have too much luggage!

Fresh vegies
Note the prices - we pay too much in Perth!

Comments

[Kerry Clark]

We have just booked a Mediterranean cruise for next March. I hope it's fair weather as I'm not much of a sailor. Enjoy! Kerry.