Updating from behind this evening thanks to a battery drain, late night and tired bones. We got up yesterday morning and had an amazing European breakfast filled with greek yogurt, fruit, breads, jam, honey, juices,coffee, boiled eggs, cereal and plates of cheese and ham. The Oceanis Hotel is one of the better hotels we've used through EF. Not only are they glad for us to be here, the hotel is clean, working AC's and they are enjoying feeding us well. WE took the bus in to Athens and kept waiting for the scenery to improve but we now know why EF puts us up in Gyfalda. It's a pretty seaside resort town and Athens is a giant armpit.Concrete structures that are not pretty at all, dirty, huge stray animal population (They have a gov' system of fixing stray dogs, as indicated by a Gov't ID tag/collar but then they are turned loose again to continue their stray lifestyle.) The highlight of yesterday was the Acropolis, to be sure. The heat is tough..100+ degrees and the hike was no joke, but we are a good lookin group of Olympic worthy specimens so we all made it. The marble that has been there for 1000's of years is well worn and thus very slick, making footing unsure and the pace is slow. Nonetheless we made it and it's just what you'd imagine. the panoramic from the Acropolis, is stellar. The Parthenon is in a state of restoration but still quite easy to imagine it during its original construction. I was most excited to see the Caryatids that I love speaking about in art history. These are the beautiful columns that are Greek women wearing the typical Greek gown/toga and are absolutely stunning. There are reproductions at the Erechtheion but they are very convincing. The decent is as tough as the climb but definitely worth the effort.
In addition to our time on the Acropolis, we went to the Parliament building and watched the oh so entertaining changing of the guards. I would liken it to London guards, complete with funny little outfits of the Greek variety. This area is surrounded by a beautiful public garden and is well shaded.
Alas, we were able to do a little shopping and sit down at a Taverna and enjoy an authentic Greek lunch. Bottle cokes are hitting the spot along with several varieties of Greek beer and the water is safe and tasty. We all had a wide gulf of cuisine from Gyros to Souvlaki to fish and beyond. The Tzatziki is great on everything I've eaten so far and the Greek salad is unlike ours stateside. It's chunked up tomatoes, cucumber, red onion, sometimes slivers of bell pepper, Kalamatas, Feta and olive oil...no lettuce. It's always in a generous bowl and delicious.
Today we headed to Delphi but this deserves a blog post of it's own. Stay tuned...
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