Jason Austin's Blog Life and times of a PHP Developer in Raleigh, NC

Mediterranean Trail 2010: Athens

This is the final post of my documentation of our Contiki trip in June 2010.  Check out the first post about Rome, the second post about Sorrento, Capri, and Pompeii, and the third post about Corfu to get caught up.

Day 8, 9 and 10:  Welcome to Athens!

Day 8 started out on a ferry, as we left the island of Corfu and headed back across the sea to Igoumenitsa, Greece.  Once we got into port, we offloaded and got on the bus that was to take us across Greece and into Athens.  The bus ride was actually pretty horrible to those of us who got motion sick.  The road was rough, windy, and for the most part, uneventful.  One of the things we did see in our 7 hour bus ride was the Rio-Antirrio bridge, which was built for the Olympics when they were in Athens in 2004.  We got a few decent pictures out the bus window, but didn’t stop to admire it.  I love bridges, so this was particularly cool.

As we entered into Athens, I noticed what a different feel it had than some of the other places we went.  Overall, the city was pretty dirty and graffiti was everywhere.  It was also very very crowded, but I think that may of had to do with the fact we were entering the city around rush hour.  We got to our hotel which had an awesome air conditioner and got cleaned up.

That evening, we headed down towards the Plaka district which was a few blocks from our hotel.  When we got down to the main square, I looked up and saw the Acropolis!  It was really amazing and very cool.  It’s situated on a hill overlooking Athens, so you have a straight-on view of it almost everywhere you go.

The Plaka district is known for food and shopping, and there were plenty of both.  Our dinner that night was a group dinner where we had some traditional greek food.  It was pretty good, but not the best food I have ever had.  After dinner, a bunch of us decided to talk a walk around through the shops and stuff.  Unlike Rome, we didn’t really have a map but I have a pretty good sense of direction so everyone started following me (yikes!).  Surprisingly, most of the shops were closed by that time, so we made our way on back to the hotel.

Back at the hotel, a few of us decided to go hang out on the roof where we had a spectacular view of the Acropolis at night.  They have spotlights lighting up the ruins and it is amazing.  Unfortunately, our cameras weren’t the greatest, but we did get a few decent pictures.  We headed to bed relatively early as we were all kinda exhausted.

The next day started with a city tour of Athens.  We saw a bunch of ruins which were tucked in almost every nook and cranny of the city.  We also went by Olympic Stadium which is extremely beautiful.  The entire thing is made of marble, including the olympic rings above the stadium.  We also saw the site of the worlds first University.

As part of the bus tour, we were dropped off at the Acropolis to spend a little time exploring there.  This was one of the places that I looked forward to the most on the trip, and it didn’t disappoint.  We had a guide for the first part of the tour, and he actually told us a lot of good information.  He was probably one of the most knowledgable location guides we had.

After making our way through the entrance to the temples and up the mountain side, the Parthenon slowly came into view.  They are continually doing restoration work (you can see the cranes in the pictures) to try to keep the ruins alive for future generations, but they are decaying pretty badly.  You can see from some of the pictures that there are pieces that are whiter than others.  These are filler pieces that were made so that the actual ruins can be reconstructed.  Pretty cool stuff.

The views of Athens from the top of the Acropolis are amazing.  You can see for miles and miles all the way around you.  We took lots of pictures   After the tour guide got done, Erin and I quickly tried to make our way around to all the little parts of the Acropolis, including the theatre and the other temples besides the Parthenon.  The theatre is actually still in use.  They had done a play there the night before.  How cool would it be to be an actor in a play that was performed on Acropolis Hill?

One thing I haven’t mentioned yet was how unbelievably hot it was that day.  Almost 50 degrees Celsius.  That’s like 120 Fahrenheit.  We had to make sure we had water everywhere we went just to stay hydrated, but you couldn’t drink the tap water.  That meant we ended up spending a good chunk of change on water.  That sucked, but it was a necessary thing.

After we got done with the Acropolis, the bus took us back towards our hotel.  Kat, Jonas, Erin and I decided we wanted to go down to the National Museum of Art in Athens.  It was about a 10 block hike, but we decided to walk it anyway.

On our way, we saw a meat market that we decided to check out.  Mostly, this was my idea because I wanted to see the crazy kinds of meat there, so blame this on me...Anyway, Kat and Erin were walking in front of me and Jonas and all of a sudden, this creepy guy in a bloody apron comes up and touches Erin on the shoulder and says “You sexy, you sexy”.  I was almost in disbelief, but I looked at him and said some choice words before walking on.  Then I looked around and noticed there was nobody there besides us and the butchers.  I quickly said to everyone that it was time to go, so we got out of there fast.  Close call, avoided.

The museum was absolutely huge.  Sculptures, art, pottery, you name it.  All the busts of the Greek gods were there, including a lot of Egyptian-themed artifacts.  The coolest part were the bronze and marble sculptures, especially the one of Zeus (or Herculues...they aren’t sure).  When we went by that particular bronze statue, Jonas decided he wanted to get his picture taken in front of it, so he gave Kat his camera and started to pose, just like the statue, in front of the statue.  Little did we know that that was a no no.  From across the room, a very angry Greek man started yelling at us.  Apparently, you can take pictures, just not pose.  He gave us the stink-eye the rest of the time we were in the room.  Good times.  We spent a few hours in the museum, but gave out soon after the posing incident.  We headed back to the hotel to take a nap and get ready for our final dinner that night.

The final dinner was an extra add-on, but almost everybody in the group was going so we decided to go too.  Our restaurant was down in the Plaka district and it was absolutely awesome.  I don’t know how many different appetizers we had that night, but it was at least 5 or 6.  Then came the main course of pork kabobs, which were outstanding.  We also had a few traditional Greek dancers come in and dance during dinner.

After we ate, some of our new friends a table over (Rich and Kate) ordered a bottle of Ouzo and invited us to have a shot.  Needless to say, the drinks were flowing freely that night and everybody was having a great time.  After leaving the restaurant and taking a bunch of group pictures in the square, we headed to a bar that was a couple of blocks from our hotel.  This is where the night gets a little fuzzy for me, but not really because of any sort of drinks I may have had...

The bar was a lot of fun, and everyone was just letting go and having a good time.  John and his girlfriend Jacquelyn bought a round of drinks and we all hit the dance floor for a good time.  As previously established, I have some of the best white-boy dancing skillz known to man, and picture evidence proves that they were on display that night.  At some point in time, I remember dancing and then the entire world started spinning.  Then...that world abruptly stopped spinning and I felt a horrible pain in my head and face.  After that, I got nothing.  What had happened was that I took a ride on the shoulders of John (who is like 10 feet tall...) and when he put me down, I had slipped on a drink that someone spilled on the dance floor.  Dance floor, meet face.  Face, meet dance floor.

As Erin tells me, I ended up passing out either because of the blood (I'm a wuss like that sometimes) or the knock to the head.  I was told that a lot of people helped me get back to the hotel and made sure my nose wasn’t broken.  To them, I say a million thanks.  I think I did a good job of scaring everyone, including our tour guide Amedeo.  Sorry guys!  Either way, I closed out Athens with a bang...literally!

The next morning I woke up looking like I had been in a fight.  I had a cut across my nose, a busted lip, and a scratch above my eye...not to mention that my whole face was bruised.  I looked pretty rough, but felt OK.  We ate a quick breakfast, then went downstairs to checkout.  Most everyone else on the tour had left the hotel already, as they got to go on an add-on cruise (lucky bastards).  We ran into Amedeo as he was checking out and we relived the story of the night before one more time.  We got checked out, called a cab, and off to the airport we went.

Saying goodbye to Athens wasn’t as hard as saying goodbye to the folks on our tour.  I’m telling you, those people were freakin amazing and I will NEVER forget the awesome time I had with them.  It was the best trip I have ever been on, and it was special to be able to spend it with my wonderful wife.  We’re already planning our next trip, and we may have to hit up some of our new Contiki friends and try to get them to join us on the next one (hint hint).

I can’t sum up the trip any more except to say “all the crazy shit I did tonight...those will be the best memories...”  See you next time Contiki!