We arrived in Port around 7:00am. We met for breakfast in the buffet. We were off to meet our guide at 7:55. He immediately escorted us to his Mercedes van and we set on our way to Athens.
Dimitri, our guide, dropped us off at our meeting point and walked us up to the road that took us to the entrance. When we got to the end, the line to purchase tickets was an hour long. I asked at the gift shop where to go with our pre-paid vouchers and was told to skip the line and go directly to booth 5. Apparently, I was supposed to check my spam folder for actual tickets yesterday. I recalled a conversation lastnight with Tavis that I am now receiving Greek spam! Hmm, I guess it wasn’t junk. Oops, my bad. The ticket agent issued us tickets anyway. We went toward the entrance and there was another hour line up just to get in. There was a tiny line on the other side. Not sure why that line was so short but we put our heads down, tickets up, and followed them. Less than 20 minutes after being dropped off, we were at the top of the Acropolis in Athens!
We spent 90 minutes leisurely walking around the site. It was amazing! It was also very breezy at the top which was appreciated. What an amazing experience!
We had a great view of the Orpheum below. Apparently, Yanni still does shows there and the acoustics are so good, you don’t even need a mic! We may have to come back to Athens to catch a Yanni concert sometime.
We met Dimitri at our meeting point at 11:30 and started on our way to the modern Olympic stadium. We had 5 minutes to take photos and he explained the history of ancient and modern Olympics. Apparently it is the largest marble stadium in the world where they held the first MODERN olympics in 1896. Not to be confused with the ancient Olympics which were held in Olympia (our stop yesterday). Dimitri also explained why they stopped holding the ancient Olympics. In AD 393 the king of Greece was worried the people may revolt after communicating about standards of living with international visitors to the Olympics. Ari asked why they started the Olympics again in 1896 and Dimitri replied by saying “Why not?”
Next we stopped at the Temple of Zeus and spent 10 minutes to see the temple. There are only 4 pillars still standing. Overall rather underwhelming but still amazing to see the scale of the pillars and imagining what it would have looked like with the original 100. My advice for this site would be to enter by the opposite side, under the ancient gates and take photos rather than entering the park itself.
Every hour is a changing of the guards. How interesting could this possibly be? It is like watching a dance. Dimitri told us that the pompoms on the guards shoes had a hidden blade in them which is why they have the kicking motion. I had to take video. If this is how they really walked, I believe it was a good strategy. If I was in a war and saw someone walking toward me in this manner I would be laughing to hard to put up any kind of fight! You have to watch the video to understand.
Next, we went to Ancient Agora. We walked to the site and wandered around. We walked to the temple Hephaestus (the greek god of fire). We also noticed many kittens throughout the site. They were really cute and came right up to is. Ari was feeling sick and we figured he had sun stroke. I stayed with him outside the museum while he rested and Tavis, Ayva, and Addison went into the museum, then to a local restaurant for some Greek cuisine. Ari started feeling better so around 12:30 we started making our way back to the meeting place. We met up with Dimitri at 1:00.
Our last stop was at the Acropolis Museum. The first thing we noticed was that it was built on an archeology site. You could see where they have excavated and uncovered ruins. After waiting in line, we went through security to get into the building and purchased tickets. It was a huge building with 3 levels. Tavis had to check his bag before going into the actual museum. We wandered around the main floor and went up to level 2. The most impressive was the top level where they had artifacts from the Acropolis of Athens. They had several ancient pieces in place to show the scale, along with some replicas. I made the mistake of touching one of the blocks to see if it was real. Yes, apparently they are real and you are not supposed to touch anything. I was given a talking to and felt like a school kid about to get detention. My bad… If you go to a museum, don’t touch anything!
We didn’t have enough time to explore the ruins under the building because we had to meet Dimitri at 2:30. He then drove us back to our home on the Splendida.
We had a great tour today. We saw a lot of Athens and Dimitri was a wealth of information. He educated us on the history of Athens and and even taught us some greek words. He also had some great advice for traveling in Greece. He suggested getting a map of the entire country and circling all the places we have heard of. Then travel somewhere else and spend some time there. The best way to see a country is through the locals, but you need time to really appreciate it. I would like to return to Greece again!
Nautical Info:
During the night, MSC Splendida passed Elafonisos Strait was possible to see on starboard side the Coastal light of Kythira island and on the portside, Maleas Cape. After that, we sailed toward the North East and then the North West towards Piraeus, Mainland Greece. Departure was at 18:00. In the evening, MSC Splendida will pass Kea Strait between Kea Island on starboard side and Makronisos Island on portside. Subsequently, we will pass the Kafireas Strait where it is possible to see on Starboard side, Andries island and on Portside, Evvol island. Distance between Piraeus and Kusadasi is 202 nautical miles.