Day 1 in Athens, a city thousands of years in the making.

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How good is Athens? Rhetorical question really. I love it. Everywhere are reminders of just how special this place is. Be it the history of the Olympics, the marathon, the Romans, the Byzantines, the great Greek thinkers (well the big 3), the Ottomans, even King Ludwig of Bavaria and particularly his son (first king of Greece) and I haven’t even mentioned the Acropolis or the Parthenon! It is so good to walk around. I’m certainly not the only one walking around, the streets are full of tourists and from all over the place. The walking tour I did had more Germans and Dutch than Aussies and they were not the only nationalities. Again the tour was pretty good. They have to be at least OK or they don’t make as much on tips. In Greece the guide said the average wage was about €700 per month, although I think it is higher as that would put it lower than Portugal and I’m confident that’s not correct. Anyway there’s no way she would get less than €250 per day doing the 2 tours she did today. I’ll try and put some details into the photos rather than go on about the tour.

Rose, one of our delightful American exchange students saw my blog today and she is in Athens and she contacted us so we got together. She’s here on honeymoon and she is as wonderful as ever. So good to see her and catch up.



I do a food tour tomorrow so again I’ll have plenty to say. Until then I’ll concentrate on the photos.

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Photos

The Greek brothers who revived the Olympics.
The house of the Zallan brothers who revived the ‘Olympics’ but just for Greeks. Now the Olympic Museum but it held events (fencing) during the 2004 Games.

Part of the 50000 marble seats.
Still used for concerts and events and still the home of the Greek marathon. Marathons are completed here, the distance being 41.8 km from Marathon. Modern marathons are 42.2 km, the Queen adding 400m during the London Olympics so they would run past the palace.

Changing of the guard.
This procedure is performed on the hour, every hour 24 hours a day.

Changing of the guard.
Guards are specially selected (must be tall, have no piercings or tattoos and must be good looking!) and are very highly trained and regarded within the armed forces.

Changing of the guard.
They must stand and not move or show emotion during their guarding duty. They represent dead soldiers, hence no emotion or movement.

Changing of the guard.
This is the ceremonial dress, I stole the picture from the internet. The ‘skirt’ has 400 pleats, representing a fold for each year of Turkish occupation.

Zeus and the family.
And you thought your family was weird! Zues’s son spilt Zeus’s head open with a sword upon Zues’s request giving birth to a fully formed and armoured Athena. Zues’s was warned but…

Shows the octagonal time, weather and astrological station
An amazing place that was used to accurately tell the time, the motion of planets sand the sun. It was used as a meteorological station as well. Quite amazing. The workings are now in the National Museum.

Comments

[RENanDREW]

Changing of the guard
We loved this ceremony and visited a couple of times, but sadly couldn't make it on a Sunday when they have the parade. Glad to read that you love Athens too :)

[robjh]

Good to hear from you. I recognise you from somewhere/sometime but always happy to see positive comments. Yes love the sights, the spirit and really just about everything here.

[robjh]

Same, same. Hello again. Final day in Athens but very happy tourists.