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Thursday 19 April 2018

The Final Countdown. Day 17: Athens

What to say about our accommodation in Athens! I'll start at the beginning. We had checked the day before what time check in opened from, which was 7am. We were a little earlier than that but figured we could just wait outside or something until they opened.

We had a bit of trouble finding the place but eventually Dan spotted the hand painted sign and we tried opening the door. Locked. A dog started barking. Tried the door a few more times. Nothing. Then we heard a voice calling out to us from inside - basically, be patient, I'm coming. The door opened and there stood a squat middle aged Greek lady who opened her arms wide and beckoned us inside. Inside looked like a living room - her living room - and she bade us take off our bags and get comfortable. It's hard to describe the decor, but this wasn't a hotel! She chatted and chatted away, asking our names again and again, bidding us welcome to Athens and apologising for her poor English. She explained again and again that we couldn't go to our room until 2pm, which was fine, but she seemed distressed by this, and we assured her it was ok as long as we could put our things somewhere and come back later.

I am a good woman, it is safe here. My husband is a policeman! She repeatedly assured us, before ushering us downstairs so that I could use the toilet. Our accommodation had a lift - a very old lift - and she took us and all our luggage jerkily down into the basement. It was pitch black down there, and she started shouting to the gentleman who I don't think was her husband but maybe the cleaner. She shouted and grew louder and louder until he turned the light on from upstairs. This toilet was for the cleaners, not the guests usually.

While down here I tried to sort myself out and figure out what I needed for the day as I didn't know if I'd get a chance once we dropped our bags. I needed my contacts and deodorant - oh yes, and there had been no time to change clothes so I had to stay in what I'd been wearing the day before and all night. Don't judge me!

I took ages and I could hear her and Dan nattering away. When I finally emerged she said Australian! and was very impressed. She then started commenting on Dan's "baby face", a theme which continued for the rest of our stay.

We went jerkily up to level 1, did another quick bag sort and finally bid our farewells. She sat there lighting up her ciggie waiting for us, saying "pretend I'm not here." I later found out her name was Dani or Deni, and she saw us down to the front door and waved us out into the day. Before we left, she told us not to go left - lots of criminals and robberies that way, stay right, and for Sasha, Sasha always keep your bag at the front!

We stepped out into the still rather dark morning air, blinked and laughed quietly to each other - what have we walked in to! Such a whirlwind for having had no sleep, we weren't sure what had happened.

First stop: breakfast. We hadn't wanted to impose so we thought today we will just buy something. Our accom was very close to Monastaraki and I realised that it was also very close to where I had stayed last time. We emerged into the square and it looked cold dark and grey. Completely uninviting. I could only think "what is Dan thinking of this place?" Athens had been my first stop on my Summer of Fun in 2015 and I traversed it alone - it had a bit of a special place in my heart. This Athens looked yuck.

We found a place doing pastries and fresh juices so after a lot of sleepy deliberation, we managed to order these. The juice waiter was Albanian of all things, and he was quick to tell me how Albania is full of drug dealers and criminals - I couldn't help but think that Athens probably wasn't any better...

We decided to make our way up to the Acropolis as it wasn't far even tho the day was quite grey and hazy. Not the best for photos but maybe our only chance. As things transpired this was an excellent decision as I will get to later!

The square was covered in graffiti and closed up shops. I could tell by Dan's face he wasn't impressed. We walked up the hill and met some kitties on the way, spirits slightly improving. We stopped to let a large group of French teenagers pass as we didn't want to have to fight for our place in the queue.

As we approched the entry point I noticed some steps up onto a rocky enclave which I had never spotted before. A few people were up there and once we were up we could see why - here was a fantastic view of the Acropolis to our right and out across Athens to our left. You could really get the full scope of how big this city is from here - it's enormous. We took a few photos and selfies and made our way back down to the ticket queue.


We needn't have worried as when we got to the ticket office, there was no queue and we were able to enter immediately. On our right was the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, and we stood next to two bogan Aussie girls with matching braided hair as they posed in front of it. We kind of followed them around the whole site and we are probably in the way of all their posed shots!

As we reached the stairs to the make our way up we could hear shouting - army style shouting. A frantic looking man was trying to keep tourists out of the way and then we spotted 6 soldiers doing drills on the stairs. They weren't able to look where they were treading - head up and tiny steps. Took them an age to go past, but gave us some great photo opportunities with all the ruins in the background! They eventually crept past us and we continued on.



There ahead of us was the Parthenon. Covered in scaffolding, as per usual. Usually I'm pretty annoyed to find a monument/building all scaffolded (and to be honest this isn't an exception) but we had a good read about the restoration work and it is a worthwhile cause. It literally looked identical to when I saw it last - but this time had a crane sticking out the Top. I'm sure some work had been done on it since then...!



We also encountered a very friendly kitty! We nicknamed him the Parthenon kitty and he didn't want us to stop patting him. So friendly!



We got to the non-scaffolded side of the Parthenon before the big crowds so took a few hurried pictures and then sat back to watch the swarms. We checked out the theatre and kept walking in that direction, coming to a closed gate, and unwilling to go back up the hill again we stood there and pondered whether we just go through it. Someone walked past and let us out and we popped out into the street. Dan was flagging, so next stop was for some coffee. We looked at a few price lists and found one that was quite cheap and settled in for some caffeine and juice.

We people watched for a while as the square got busier as it got later in the morning. We devised our plan: the archaeological museum opened at 1: we would meander our way through the Athens markets and head towards the museum for lunch and opening time.

Plan in place we set off. Now Athens was coming alive - the streets were buzzing, all the graffitied shop fronts had lifted their barriers and displayed amazing (touristy) wares. Beautiful dresses, ouzo, evil eye jewellery. We kept on walking towards the museum and hit a really rough patch. I mean a really rough patch.
"Would you like anything? Marijuana?" Was the only one I caught as I held my bags closer and kept on walking, Dan behind me.

Big groups of men leering at us - we were no longer in the nice buzzy bright section of Athens but it's seedy underbelly. We eventually came out the other side and arrived at the museum. Across from the museum is a nice albeit expensive and touristy restaurant so we rested our tired feet here, had some wine and a feed (Greek salad for me!) and when we were sufficiently rested we went into the museum.

I expected a queue here too but there was only one person in front of us. Super easy, checked my backpack and we were in. Now I have been here before - Acropolis and the Archaeological Museum but Dan hasn't, and to be honest I was with a Contiki group and wasn't able to peruse at my leisure (or walk past things I found uninteresting) so it was nice to be able to do it my (and Dan's) way, no compromises.

I pointed out to Dan some of the funny things I had seen last time, like the statues with the star shaped pubes and the statue that the Starbucks coffee logo is apparently based on. We walked past what felt like a billion clay pots (and it was almost like I had a tic, I kept muttering "Pots pots, pots. Pots." Probably the lack of sleep.) Lots of pots. Loads of statues from varying ages - many created hundreds of years BC. Basically statues and pots. Lots of pots.



Oh and the gold mask of Agamemnon is really cool! There's something about seeing these objects in a museum right near where they were found - unlike something like the British Museum which has pilfered so many things (including about half of the Parthenon). Maybe one day these big museums will give back what isn't really theirs?

We took our time here but eventually our feet got sore so it was time to walk back to our accom and check in properly. We walked a different route to avoid Dodge Alley arriving about 3pm.

We were gently chastised by the accom owner as we had originally said we would be back about 2pm. This accommodation didn't really let us come and go with ease, to be honest! We had to keep checking on time which was slightly annoying but to be fair, Dani is a story all in her own and definitely part of our Athens story!

Back at the accommodation, we had to wait while Dani tried to help her elderly mother wait and then into a taxi. Much confused Greeklish reigned, lots of smiling and head nodding, something about Budapest (I honestly have no idea what Budapest had to do with anything) and we air kissed her nonna goodbye, and it was time for us to finally head towards our room.

Dani told us that our luggage is already upstairs, and we all piled into the lift and up to level 3. When we got there and stepped out of the lift, Dani pointed to a small futon bed just outside the lift and said "All of this, this level, yours. You sleep here." Dan and I looked at each other. I was like "Ahhh, ok...! And the bathroom?"
"Basement downstairs. Like before."
"Oh. Um, ok." Thinking to myself, "she is gonna get one hell of a bad review!"

Then she lost it in fits of laughter, saying I was such a good girl and no, our room is through the door to the left. Tricked! And fell for it. Although she then told us stories of other people who had been tricked too, so I'm not the only gulliable one! It was true that this whole level was ours, and when she opened the door she led us into a room that was bigger than our entire apartment in Berlin. The floor was adorned with mismatching rugs of various sizes, colours and materials. On one side was a single bed and the other, a queen bed, and there was also a small kitchen and a large sofa. There was even a balcony, and if you opened the window and leeeaaaaannnnned out you could see the corner of the Acropolis.

It was bright and vibrant and had as much personality as our host. She kept chuckling to herself about my reaction (maybe I was the first to be like...oh, ok? Instead of FUCK no!) and showed us every corner of the room and how everything worked (including showing us the new mattress and how clean everything was).

At the bathroom, Dani stopped and said "This I can say in perfect English." Pauses for effect. "Do not put the paper in the toilet." If you haven't been to Greece you may not know that you can't flush toilet paper there - the pipes and sewage system is so old and so small that paper clogs it very easily. And no one wants an overflowing toilet! There are always large bins placed nearby. It takes some getting used to but after a day or two you're in the swing of it (and most places have signs to remind you).

Dani offered us a coffee and has we had denied one earlier, this time we said yes. She repeated that she was good woman, good mumma, and if we need anything to shout "Dani! Mumma!" And she would come help. After some time she left and we were able to collapse in a fit of giggles. She returned a short while later with our coffees, which were actually delicious.

At this point I decided to look up how to get to ancient Olympia on the morrow and realised that I may have made a grave error. You see, Dan has done basically all the transport planning (I do most of the attractions and I do all the food planning) but for some reason I had looked up Olympia. In essence, I had a timetable - but absolutely no clue where to catch the bus from in Athens. The timetable had a ticket office address on it and opening times from 7am the next morning, so after panicking considerably Dan convinced me that we would be ok - we would go to the ticket office first thing in the morning and work it out from there.

Dan had wanted to see the new old Olympic stadium in Athens from the 1896 first modern Olympics. We could walk, but that would take us through the dodgy area again so we decided to catch the metro. This was a great idea as we bought 24 hour tickets which we DEFINITELY got our money's worth out of in the end! We left the accommodation with Dani asking, "When will you be back?" You see, they stay awake for their guests, "1am?" Dan and I both burst into laughter - we could barely stand right now and it was 5pm, let alone going out and partying all night. 9pm is more like it for this old couple...

We left and metroed one stop and, popping out, realised we were in front of parliament with lots of people on front. Maybe the guards are changing? We wandered over and the guards were doing their amazing dance routine (if you've seen it before, you know what I'm talking about!) I don't even know how to describe what they were doing and I have absolutely no idea of the history behind it (or their costumes). In essence the two guards walk towards each other slowly, kicking one leg up and flopping a pom-pomed foot around until they eventually meet in the middle. Then the touch outstretched pom-pomed feet, and do some funny twirl things before returning to the other side, occasionally pawing their feet like bulls. It's truly amazing and I love it - I need to find out what it's all about!



Happy we had caught this, it was time to go to the stadium. It closed at 7pm however we hadn't intended to go inside as you can see a lot from outside for free. We walked through the botanic gardens and got a bit lost as we hit a fence when we thought we could join the main road again but after a short backtrack we were on the right path again.

The sunlight was a gentle yellow lighting up the stadium just before 7pm when we got there. We took a bunch of photos and returned via metro to the main square where we were going to find dinner.



Riding the metro is not a relaxing experience in Athens. The metro, in particular, is EXTREMELY bad for pickpockets and I have heard a lot of horror stories. I desperately do not want to become a horror story, so I keep my belongings held tight to my body or push my back up against the door or wall, outing myself even further as a tourist, no doubt.

I had googled best cheap eats and came across Tylxito Greek Wrap that was super close to our accommodation. It had little indoor seating, most was on the pedestrian street and we luckily found a little table slightly away from the crowd so we could feel a bit more comfortable with our bags and also people watch.

We were a little hungrier than a normal gyros so we got a pita each and a half carafe of wine and it was all delicious. Highly recommend this hole in the wall! While under the influence of the wine, we formulated a plan. Before we left the accom we had grabbed my tripod as I had said we should try to take some night photos of the Acropolis if we could. We googled best places to go; I had wanted to climb Mt Lycabettus, which I referred to as the Boob because it's kind of shaped like one but the climb was rather intrepid for nighttime adventures and the view not overly great. Dan found the Philoppapos Hill and the views looked pretty speccy- also it was a little closer and on a path we already knew. So off we went!

We climbed back up to the ticket offices at the Acropolis but this time turned right and started climbing up towards the monument on the hill. There was no light here but we weren't the only ones making the trek. Every so often in a clearing a few people were set up with beers or cameras just surveying the scene. We kept going and eventually found a little nook of our which offered spectacular views. I set up my tripod and Dan set up on a rock and we spent some time trying to take pretty pictures of the Acropolis with the theatre in the foreground.

By now we were very weary - it was almost 10pm and we had been up for over 36 hours. Time to call it a night. We returned to our accommodation, said our good nights to our hosts, set our alarm for early the next morning and collapsed into bed.

Til next time
xx

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