This is going to be a short post, as we didn’t take any pictures on day 4, which was primarily concerned with getting from point A (Athens) to point Θ (Thessaloniki). Got up, went to train station, got on train, sat.  Also sat.  The train left an hour late, but apparently this is not at all unusual.  The trip across Greece was pretty, but uneventful.

When we arrived at Thessaloniki, we made the mistake of walking from the train station to our hotel.  It seemed like a good idea on paper, but Google Maps doesn’t tell you things like – “There’s no way to get out of the train station on foot,” or “It’s 100 degrees, dumbass, wouldn’t you rather take a cab?” (Ed. by Leigh: Or, things like, “It will be obvious that nobody ever walks on this sidewalk when you have to dodge a small tree growing out of the middle of the pavement surrounded by weeds on one side and a watermelon on the other.”)

Leigh checked in for her conference, and then we took a bus downtown with Vicky Williamson, a friend of ours from the UK, where we had a very nice dinner of various fried Greek items, including cheese and cheese. At the end of the meal, the waiter brought us free drinks (ed. by Leigh: luckily not Ouzo), which meant that Leigh and Vicky each got half of mine.

Statistics:

• Means of Transportation Employed: Train, Bus
• Cumulative Total: 7
• Geocaches Found: 1
• Likelihood of mispronouncing “Thessaloniki”: ~50%
• Meals with cheese: 2
• Free stuff: after-dinner drinks

On our first day in Athens we did a walking tour of the city, so today we decided to concentrate on three specific sites – the National Archaeological Museum, the Roman Agora, and the Acropolis Museum.

The Archaeological Museum was fascinating.  With so MUCH history accumulated in this city, it’s hard to imagine you could plant a tomato bush in your backyard without unearthing the ruins of Atlantis or the like.

Also, apparently Matt Groening was around in ancient Macedonia.

After a tasty lunch on a little street known as “souvlaki row,” we headed to the Roman Agora, where you can just wander about and poke things, which is a bit staggering to Americans used to the hands-off approach of museums and archaeological sites in this country.

At this point, the heat started getting to us again, so we headed to the Acropolis Museum.  They didn’t allow photography, so we don’t have any pictures from there, but it’s a stunning building.  It was built expressly to convince the British Museum to return the enormous hunk of the Parthenon they stole in the early 1800s.  To date, it hasn’t worked.

For our last trick, we hiked up yet ANOTHER hill in the Athens area, this one just south of the Acropolis.  The view from the top was again amazing.

Just to the right of the Parthenon, you can see the hill we hiked up at sunset on the first day.  For dinner, we walked down a long street just north of the Agora which is lined with outdoor tavernas.  Every restaurant in Athens has a tout whose job it is to stand outside and hassle you to stop and eat in their establishment.  It’s quite annoying.  We eventually settled on a restaurant that had an attractive sans-serif sign, and a less intrusive tout than most.

Good choice.  For twenty euros we got feta and spearmint dumplings in pomegranate sauce, salad with Mykonian cheese, chicken with figs, 12-hour-cooked pork with lime and basil cream, and a lovely chocolate mousse with mastiha.  And a view of the Parthenon.

Statistics:

• Modes of Transportation: Subway
• Percentage of Athens Subway Lines Used: 100%
• Number of Geocaches Found: 2
• Highest Altitude: 147 m
• Moose Deployed: 1

For day 2, our plan was to visit an island, and Hydra was the recommended choice for a day trip from Athens.  Hydra is pronounced “Ee-dra”, just like “Gyro” is really pronounced “ee-rho,” and “typically” is actually pronounced “ee-pically.”  After an early start to catch our connections, we arrived on Hydra at about 10 AM to be confronted with this picturesque view.

Hydra is a fairly small island – over 90% of the population lives in this main town.  There are no motorized vehicles except for a few garbage trucks.  Somehow, we managed to encounter this truck about four times in the first hour, but after that the lack of traffic noises was very noticeable.  Instead, you encountered “parking lots” like the one in the blog’s banner image and this one.

Hydra, even more than most Greek towns, is also full of cats.  I think their intended purpose is to deal with vermin, but these guys seemed mostly interested in sleeping under tables at the waterfront tavernas.

Interesting trivia note: Leonard Cohen wrote “Bird on a Wire” while living on Hydra.  Probably not about this exact bird, but possibly this wire!

After exploring the main town for a bit, we walked down the coast to a nearby fishing village, and then decided to come back via the “high road” through town above the water.  And by “high road,” we mean “just keep attempting to go east through tiny cracks between houses.”  Astonishingly, this actually worked, despite the fact that this is what a “street” on Hydra usually looks like.

Eventually it was time for dinner, so we went back to the fishing village for a lovely meal of grilled red mullets (heads still attached) and octopus while sitting at a table overlooking the ocean.  Then it was time for another sunset!

Finally, back to Athens.

Statistics:

• Modes of Transportation used: Subway, Hydrofoil, Boat
• Cumulative Total: 5
• Geocaches Found: 1
• Meals Containing Feta: 2
• Free stuff: After-dinner fruit

The reason for our trip to Greece was a conference of Leigh’s in Thessaloniki: a joint meeting of the European Society for the Cognition of Music and the International Conference on Music Perception and Cognition.  (What a mouthful!)  We made a point of arriving early so we could spend some time in Athens.  This turned out to be a really good idea.

This is Syntagma square, home of the Greek Parliament building and guards with pom-poms on their feet.  After dropping off our luggage at the hotel, we went on a self-guided walk around town, with the Acropolis as our ultimate goal.

This is the remains of the temple of Zeus.  It’s hard to believe, but this was actually larger than the Parthenon when it was still standing.

Speaking of which:

How would you like this to be your front door?  Coming from a country where “old” means a hundred years at best, it’s astonishing to climb stairs that have been around for 2,500 years.

And there it is.  The Parthenon is one of those things like the Grand Canyon.  You see the pictures, and figure it can’t possibly be that impressive in person.  And yet – they both are.

This is another temple on the same hill.  I’m sort of proud of this picture.  It really captures the “Lawrence of Arabia” level of really, really, hot that the weather was that day.  It was about 100 degrees when we were there.  Which is apparently 15 degrees cooler than it had been the week before.

After a long day of walking around Athens, we decided it would be a good idea to climb yet ANOTHER hill (climbing hills turns out to be a theme of this trip) to watch the sun set.

And it was.

Statistics:

• Modes of Transportation used: Airplane, Subway, Funicular Railway
• Cumulative Total: 3
• Geocaches Found: 4
• Highest point: 277 meters