First Day in Athens

Today was a long day to say the least. Yesterday, my sister and I flew from Charlotte, NC to Philadelphia, and from Philadelphia to Athens, Greece. The flight to Philly was harmless. We got there around 10:30am. Our flight from Philly to Athens was to take off a little after 4:00pm. We had time to kill, for sure. We wandered the place, had asian food in the food court, sat in rocking chairs while listening to a live band play, and then got Starbucks from a shop that only been open for four days and they were as inexperienced as you'd imagine, but worse.

Our flight to Greece was as easy as could be. And we arrived at 8:30 local time. We got our packs and went to find the express bus to take us to Syntagma. The bus driver was no help, saying that the stop we wanted was earlier, making us believe that it was in fact the correct stop. Then while I was getting out of the bus, he closed the door on me. Twice.

Ann and I spent the next 4 hours walking around Athens basically lost. We always knew how to get back to home base (the bus stop) and kept trying different routes to our hostel, confused about why we hadn't found it yet. We both are normally very good with maps and directions, but when your maps and directions are in English and the street signs are all in Greek, the maps are only confusing you not helping you.

When I was at the point of painful and scary dehydration (caused by walking for miles in the heat with a forty pound pack on my back and having to carry two other bags...nbd..) we stopped so I could get water and we asked for directions again. We had asked directions twice before from people who had no idea what we were talking about. But this man was our savior. That is when we learned that the bus stop was not the right one. So we kept on walking. On the way we finally came across the metro and we took that opportunity to get to the right place without walking for additional miles.

Once we got off the metro at Syntagma, our hostel, the Acropolis House, was easy to find. Ann and I collapsed on the bed and took well deserved naps.

When we finally woke up it was around 5:30. We got ready and headed out. We walked through the national gardens and then walked around the ruins of the Temple of Olympian Zeus. It was so incredible to see something like that in real life. It's amazing that something like that even existed so long ago. We're going to the Acropolis tomorrow and seeing this site today is making me even more excited.

For dinner, Ann and I went to a restaurant called Oasis. The people who work there are so nice, spoke English, and gave very good recommendations. I asked what was on the menu that had no meat and he suggested that we get a Greek salad and Greek spaghetti and split them. So we did and I'm glad.

We managed to end the day on a very high note and I can't wait for what Athens has enstore for us tomorrow.