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Published: July 13th 2011
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July 3-July 7
After leaving my parents and brother at the train station in Florence (they were headed to Siena for the Palio) I set off on the train for Rome. I arrived mid-day and took a taxi out to my hotel, which was pretty much in the middle of nowhere because I had wanted to be near the airport. There was nothing to do. I really did leave the hotel looking to entertain myself, but ended up watching "30 Rock" in Italian until dinner time.
I got up at 3:30 am and headed to the airport. After a ridiculously long line to check my baggage I made it to my flight to Athens just in time. Luckily my day got much less stressful when I arrived in Athens to the two-kiss greeting of my childhood pen pal Rita. Rita and I have been writing for about 20 years and this is our first chance to meet in person. She is just as kind and just as much fun in person as she is in letters...probably actually more so. And it was so nice to not have to figure out what was going on in a new city all
by myself.
We decided to take a bus instead of the metro into the city so that I could see some of Athens on the way. We had to get off and change buses at Syntagma Square which is where all the protesting was happening that they'd been showing on the news. It was a Sunday afternoon and all was quite calm though the square is full of banners and tents with people camped out.
After taking me to my hotel to check-in and change clothes we headed over to Rita's house. I got to meet both her mom and her dad. They were quite lovely, her mom and I chatted for only a few minutes, but boy did we cover a lot of ground! Then we took the family car and went to a marina (I can't remember the name). It was beautiful. Full of yachts with the water sparkling and the city in the background. It was a lovely setting to have lunch and catch up, which is just what we did. She also pulled out a tiny notepad and made me a cheat sheet of Greek words I should know. Those few words are still
the only ones I attempt to say.
Rita dropped me off at the hotel and we both took a couple of hours to relax and nap a bit. She came back to get me (after quite a misunderstanding with the guy answering the phone at the hotel) and we walked up to Acropolis. It's just a few minutes from the hotel. Wow! what and incredible sight, especially in the evening light. We went out on a rock that overlooks the city and took a bit to just take it all in. It was truly beautiful!
Then we walked around a bit and ended up at a restaurant that Rita's family frequents. It was beyond lovely and the food was amazing. Rita's parents had been very bothered that I don't eat meat, because I can't eat many Greek specialties, but there was (and has been since) such good meatless food.
Rita dropped me off at the hotel well after midnight and I headed up to sleep until I woke up in the morning.
Monday was a bit of a disaster. It was just one of those days where nothing goes as planned but also nothing good comes
of the unexpected. Though the good news is that nothing really bad happened either. I slept in late and headed out with the goals for the whole day being to buy ferry tickets, find and internet cafe and meet up with Rita after she got off work. I took care of the ferry tickets, but the rest was not to be. I searched for several internet cafes (none still in existence) and basically spent hours wandering the streets of Athens. It was nice to get a feel for the place at least. Even the tourist information office had moved and I couldn't make it to the new office in time. Then I waited for Rita in the main square for a couple of hours. But because of a misunderstanding at the hotel I didn't realize that she wasn't coming. By the time we did connect it was too late to try and get together. I did get in some good people watching surrounded by protest posters and crowds of people passing through.
Tuesday I went to the tourist info and got the address for a real internet cafe. I dealt with what I needed to there and then headed
Marina in Athens
I was here for lunch with Rita. to the new Acropolis museum in the afternoon.
It was very interesting, and informative, but the best part was that a lot of the floor is made of glass and you can look below you to see some of the excavations that they are doing. It's very cool. Rita and I actually succeeded in meeting up to hang out this and an it was very lovely.
Wednesday I spent the morning at the Archaeological Museum which is insanely huge. I spent at least 2 hours and basically had time to walk through and read about one or two things that looked interesting in each room.
This was the night that Arantxa was arriving, but there was a taxi strike which threw a wrench in my plan to pick her up at the airport, take a bus into the main part of the city and then just catch a cab from there. We ended up just walking the 20 minutes or so to the hotel from the main square. They had the square blocked off and people were protesting outside of the parliament building, but it was quite peaceful and we sort of walked right through it. It was
a bit of a pain at one in the morning with luggage and all, but we made it safe and sound.
Thursday we got up and headed to the Acropolis stopping for breakfast at the bakery along the way. We made it there before 9am which I thought was pretty good considering the night before and Arantxa's full day of travel before that.
The Acropolis was beautiful and nice to walk around when you could find a way to avoid the huge quantity of tour groups and disturbing little bugs. Then we headed down to the Ancient marketplace. We actually enjoyed this more as it was much less crowded and we just took our time wandering around. We had lunch in the center of the city. We had both marked the same restaurant recommended in the guidebook on the map I'd been carrying around, but we didn't write down the name. So when we got to the street we didn't know which restaurant it actually was. Lesson learned.
We watched the changing of the guards at the tomb of the unknown soldier in front of the parliament building. I'd seen it the day before, but it is
truly entertaining enough to watch again and again. They have pompoms on their shoes which look crazy now, but used to be used to hide a small knife. The best part is when a soldier in full military camo goes up to each of the new guards and fixes their uniforms until they are perfect and then wipes the sweat off their brows and faces.
After a nap at the hotel we met Rita for dinner. We walked around a bit, and I got in trouble for not taking Arantxa to all the cool places that Rita had taken me. Because I am so lame we had to go back to the metro station that has ancient ruins behind glass inside of it. By far the most interesting metro station ever! And then we went to dinner. We went to one of the restaurants where you can sit on the roof and you have a view of the Acropolis lit up at night. It was quite a nice meal with a fantastic view and wonderful company.
We headed back to the hotel before midnight so that we could pack up and get ready to leave on our early
morning ferry to the islands.
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Melissa
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Thanks for sharing Shalea...this was interesting and the pictures were wonderful:) Hope the rest of the trip goes by easier...have fun you two!