Bucket list checkoff

Today was Athens, and our final port in Greece. We docked early, and we had a 7:15 group meeting time. We decided to skip breakfast, and just get a coffee and a pastry at Bacio. So, up at 6:30, dressed and out at 7:10. It was a little tight on time but I did have just enough time to grab a latte to go. Down two decks, to find the rest of our group of 10 waiting. We were with people we knew - Adele and Frank, Beth and her Aunts and our occasional dinner companions Claude and Carolyn. After introductions were made, we headed off the ship. Just off the ship we found a young woman holding a sign with Adele's name on it. She introduced hereself as our guide Georgia, and then introduced Mario, our driver. We headed to our van to explore Athens. Our first stop was to be the centerpiece and bucket list item - the Acropolis.

On the way, Georgia let us know about a potential problem for our schedule - the French President was visiting for the day, and roads in Athens would be closed periodically.

We arrived at the base of the Acropolis. It's on a hill, and the only way to get there is up the hill on foot. A couple of people in our group decided not to go up. I understand that the lines can be terrible, so our guide and driver pre purchased our tickets for us.

We headed up the hill, and then entered the site. We first looked at a small temple of Athena Nike, (meaning victory, not Athena of the shoe company). It's a small temple just to the side of the Propylaea, the gateway to the acropolis. We then we to the Propylaea, and watched the end of the daily ceremony where soldiers go up the Acropolis to place the flag, and then head down. There march was an interesting variant of a goose step, for lack of a better term. To see it, look at soldiers at acropolis on you tube.

From there, after some very good explanations by our guide, we headed up to to the top of the Propylaea (the gate) and saw the Parthenon. Bucklist checkoff! They are in the process of doing a restoration, so the Parthenon was covered with scaffolding, but still pretty impressive. Next to it is the Erechtheum (makes me giggle), originally a temple to both Athena and Poseiden. One of the most impressive features was the 6 statues of maidens holding up one corner. Here on the hill the statues are replicas. Five of the originals are in the Acropolis museum, and one is in the British museum, as it was stolen by Lord Elgin and then sold to the British museum. The British museum says they bought it legally, so it's theirs. The Greeks, of course, want it back. We also saw the remains of the Odeon of Herodes (theatre) as well as some others.

We wandered around there for a while, and then decided to head to the center of Athens. However, the French President had other ideas, and we were blocked on various roads. So Georgia decided we should go to the Acropolis museum first. We went there, and once again a couple of people decided not to go. Georgia gave them some shopping ideas, and they went off. We all purchased our tickets, and she lead us through the museum. There were both many items taken off the hill, and some replicas showing how they would have been during ancient times. The two most impressive things for very different reasons were the 5 maidens, with an empty pedestal for the empty one (one other is in pieces, but held together) and the lego replica of the entire hill. It has 120,000 pieces and took 300 hours to build. While it's pretty accurate in showing what the hill looked like, there are a few interesting figures along with the ancient Greeks. Performing in the Odeon is Elton John (lucky ancient greeks), and Gandalf in his wagon is heading in.

After the museum, we again tried to get our city tour. No luck, president still there. So instead, we headed to Monastiraki Square - the remains of an old monastery. It's a center of stores, restaurants and the Athens flea Market. When we got there, Georgia told us we had two hours, which seemed like a lot. Oh well.

We joined Claude and Carolyn for lunch at one of the restaurants on the square. Georgia had warned us that the portions were huge. We got one order each of Tiropitakia (cheese turnovers) - we should have shared one. Glen and I shared a kabob with yoghurt sauce, and they shared a mixed grill. Both were a lot of food and we were glad we shared. Also, all of us were going to specialty restaurants this night. We then still had an hour and a half to kill so we wandered some of the streets. First we walked up one and found a church. In the courtyard was a status of the Archbishop of Greece during the second world war - he was apparently a great humanitarian. We then turned and went through the Plaka old part of Athens. We saw the oldest house in Athens, and looked at the Roman Agora and the Library of Hadrian sets of ruins, but we were a little ruined out, so opted not to pay to go in.

We eventually made our back to the square via different streets, and found the local Starbucks. When we got back to the square, we found Claude and Carolyn sitting on the steps of the metro - they'd seen all they wanted to. We hung out with them for a bit and then went to a bakery for some coffee. I also got a baklava, which I tried back on the ship. (I can get just as good at home). They then came over to the bakery - apparently where they were sitting was a haven for pigeons and they were doing their business all over our friends. We could find nowhere to sit in the shade that wasn't going to be a pigeon haven, so we just stood and waited until the rest of the group showed up and Georgia came to get us.

After that, we headed to the Temple of Zeus ruin and the Hadrian's Arch. The temple was started by the Greeks and completed by the Romans. Pretty impressive, lots of standing columns still, and ruins of homes and bath houses.

By that time, supposedly the French President had gone home, so we could continue our tour. We saw the city hall, the olympic stadiums, and a great view from a high point above the city.

We finished at the Parliament building, in by the tomb of the unknown soldier. Georgia explained about the two army guards who are there. They don't move at all for the hour they are there and if there's some sort of problem they can bang their bayonet on the ground to attract the attention of the regular army guy that's with them. They wear traditional mountain wear. Every hour there's a changing of the guard. We got there at 3:50, so waited for the 4 pm changing. It was fascinating. I actually did a video, but don't know how to post it, so you'll have to find that on you tube. Apparently the elaborate leg and foot motion is representative of what they did in mountains, and requires special training (ballet would help if that's a gig you'd want). It looked a little like a Lindy hop basic to me. Also, from what I see on YouTube, the dress changes by season.

While watching this, they closed the road, since apparently the French hadn't left yet. Mario, our driver (dubbed super Mario based on his ability to get around stopped traffic) went across 4 lanes of traffic to make a u turn before the road closure. We drove to the port, and got back to the ship around 4:45. Perfect timing.

Glen and I dropped our stuff and went down to Michaels club. I took advantage of my Verizon travel pass and called my mother and sister. I also watched the gangway - I watched a few people, between 5:15 and 5:28 running towards the ship. They were fine, though since the passenger back on time was 5:30. However, the gangway stayed down for about 45 minutes. There were several police cars there (one the concierges told me it was probably port police and they're always there when a ship doesn't leave). People kept coming and going. Finally a few people got off with suitcases, got into both the police and regular cars, and drove off. Then we left. We never found out why, but Manuala (concierge) said she heard that there was a family emergency of some sort.

Tonight we had dinner at Murano planned. Our reservation was at 8:30 and we were so hot and sweaty that we decided to take showers. We went back to the room, and our laundry that we'd sent out was back. I noticed the dry cleaning wasn't there, so we called Arun. He said he'd bring it shortly and he did. Between when we called and he arrived, we counted our items and a shirt of mine was missing. Panic set in, since the last time we had missing laundry was in 2010, and I'm still waiting for it to show up. Arun said he'd take care of it. I figured the shirt was lost for good - oh well.

At 8:30 we headed down to Murano. They gave us a nice table by the window, but the restaurant was pretty loud due to a couple of large parties. The service was good, but a lot of people helping. I had the what they called a forest mushroom carpaccio aka mushroom soup, and Glen had the pear in philo dough to start. We also shared a spinach salad. All were good. We split the Chateaubriand for two, and it was very good. We both had the Grand Marnier souffles. While waiting for this the brought some small cookies and such, mostly chocolate.

After dinner, we went back to the room, and pretty much went to bed early since it was a very early and long day.