Bali Bound

This is the view from my first hotel room that wouldn't load.  Fabulous right? Athens isn't a really green city, but I found that wherever they could put any sort of greenery they did. Here I am up on the roof garden with the lovely view of Athens behind me This is a stadium near the acropolis we visited Our first view of the parthenon.  It's up high but you have to be in the right spot to see it! The Erichtheon on the Acropolis, with the Caryatids.  You can't see them too well but they are the pillars shaped like ladies.  These are reproductions as the originals are now in the Acropolis Museum Parthenon entrance Me at the Parthenon A church in the ancient Agora.  Every little town on the way to the other sites seemed to have a church very similar to this. Lemon tree, there were so many citrus trees, it was a regular occurence to see oranges all over the streets Roman baths they uncovered while trying to buil...

Oh air canada.  I still don't know what to say.  I spent my flight fending off the flight attendants who kept wanting me to turn my light on.  Easier said than done when I turned on my neighbours light and vice versa. They also had some sort of issue with attaching the exit galley to the plane.  Getting off the plane was weird because the exit was shaking back and forth.  We all looked a little drunk getting off. But the best part.  Learned that the smoke detectors don't really work well as someone snuck a smoke on the plane.  They didn't find them.  I thought it was weird that all of a sudden the plane smelled like cigarette smoke.  And then there was an announcement about the $5000 fine and legal penalties.  I'm guessing it was one of the Greek passengers who think rules don't apply to them.  But this is a first for me.  The flight attendants then spent most of the remaining flight hidden, I think as damage control as I'...

Have reached the gate in the Athens airport.  To my dismay there is literally nothing but seats and bathrooms at the gates.  What ever happened to having security and then the gates, food and shopping.  Glad that I came prepared and had a big breakfast at the hotel this morning.  But I'm finding that more and more airports are moving this way.  Which feels incredibly inconvenient for the traveller.  It's nice to have gone through security and all that and then have time to leisurely eat and shop around while waiting.  Instead I'm trapped in this terrible concrete box for the next hour and a half.  Thankfully I do have Internet!  

Sadly this was the last touring day in Greece.  I was correct about my non existent morning as I have to leave by 8:30 tomorrow.  But that's okay, it's hard to get enough time to do anything interesting.  And I can't think of too much else to see or do...  The one guidebook said that if you have extra days get out of Athens because there are more interesting things to see.  And boy have I seen a lot! Today on the bus wasn't very adventuresome.  It was a 5-6 hour drive back to Athens and they really wanted to arrive before rush hour so that we wouldn't spend another hour stuck in traffic.  We stopped in Meteora to see an icon studio.  It's a religious decoration that is all hand painted.  It's very rich in detail and symbolism.  But if you want a Holy Mary surrounded in gold leaf for a lot of money it was the place to go.  We also drove past the Olympic stadium complex, didn't stop, but wow is it big!  The stop we were to hav...

I really wish that my iPad had arrow buttons. What I we trying to say, is that between getting in breakfast, and travelling to the airport early enough I think that my morning will be non existent.  It's nice that I'm not leaving until noon so maybe I can sleep in a little.  Stranger things have happened. But it has been a fabulous holiday and I've seen so much of Greece.  And as much fun as it has been I'm ready to come home.  It feels sad after only a week but travelling alone is a little different. My random thoughts on Greece for the night.  I've been noticing a ton of postcards with these adorable, plump cats and dogs on them.  The sad reality is that most of the strays aren't plump.  And in general the Greeks don't really even seem to notice them.  But I suppose the tourists like the idea of all purpose Greek pets that belong to everybody and nobody.  Or at least that is what Greece tries to spin it as.  I guess I struggle w...

The Internet is a little spotty here so things might be a little strange...  But that's nothing new! Was another exciting day.  We headed north to Meteora home of the monasteries in the sky.  It was a bit of a ride again but we did get enough stops to keep us occupied.  Our first stop was at a gas station that had 2 peacocks and pigeons in a cage around back.  Random combination.  But a nice diversion.  Most of the gas stations aren't nearly as exciting or as big as at home so there isn't too much to do other than a bathroom break. After that we had a quick pit stop at the location where the Spartans were defeated as depicted in the movie 300.  So we had a quick walk around and picture opportunity.  They have a plaque where it happened and a big commemorative wall monument.  But because the Spartans were a military society they left very little behind to be studied. We also had time and lunch in Kalambaka, the village at the ...

Good news, bad news.  I found a computer to actually type on so hopefully this will just all be one lovely post.  Bad news, all the sites are in Greek which can make it hard to decipher what to do...  But the keyboard isn't all weird so that is positive. Today was another mountain day.  We drove through the Arcadian mountains north to Delphi!  I can really see all that was done in Greece to prepare for the Olympics.  We did get to take the fancy new bridge that connects the Peloponnese to the mainland.  It's really beautiful and can handle a 2 metre sway during an earthquake!  I did have to laugh because it's really such a short span.  Probably a little longer than the High Level bridge in Edmonton.  But it makes a huge difference because otherwise I think you had to take a ferry across.  So we did get a little stop and walk around there. We also passed through the construction region.  I guess right around the Patra regio...

Back to my crazy Greek friend.  I haven't caught his name as it is very Greek so I don't really understand.  But he seems to be an unofficial ambassador of all things Greek.  He follows the group trying to rein in the stragglers, suggest what we should try to eat and does some translating.  But now that they know I'm travelling alone he seems to keep trying to get me included.  But the problem is that after dealing with people all day an overbearing Greek guy is a little much for me.  But he's fairly harmless and he is travelling with a lady friend of some sort.  It should be interesting to see how threat couple days play out.  But it's mostly when we are at the hotel.  Like when he was ,walking by with his friend and had to take a picture of me... But the one thing that I find hilarious is that the Greeks are really like the dad on My Big Fat Greek Wedding.  All things Greek are great and our guides goal is to have us be Greek and lov...

For a smaller country there is still quite a bit of time to travel between places.  Especially when all the ancient sites are usually off the beaten track. Today we hit ancient Olympia, both the site and the museum.  It was all out together and our tour group did the first set of group intros only today.  I guess she used to do it on the site of the Olympic stadium but she isn't allowed anymore.  I'm figuring out more names and the group is feeling a little more cohesive after being on the bus for a few days now.  There is one guy who is Greek but I think he lives in Toronto, but he seems to think he is the assistant tour guide or something.  I really did think he worked at the last hotel until I had dinner with his group last night.  But for the most part there isn't anyone who is terribly offensive. The one drawback for the tours is that everyone wants their piece of the pie.  All the tours involve some sort of stop where they show you how s...

I really hate technology sometimes.  I tried to post my blog and it disappeared.  So here I try again. We left lovely Athens and headed south to the peloponnese, it is a beautiful region with all the mountains and greenery, of which Athens has very little.  We had a busy day today with multiple stops.  It is nice because they are so close to each other so it means less time on the bus. Our first stop was the Corinth canal.  I've seen pictures before and it looks so pretty and serene.  Not so much in real life.  Don't get me wrong, it's very interesting and pretty but not nearly as nice as the postcards and such would have you believe.  They do have pedestrian walkways for you walk along to take pictures and that is when the feat of building the canal becomes very apparent.  You could miss the canal if you didn't know what you were looking for!  It's pretty narrow.  But no boats today to watch. After that we headed farther sout...

Part two.  Due to some technical difficulties with my iPad not letting me scroll down here is the rest of my post! Back to the museum.  I like bones and mummies and all that.  Pottery shards are a little dull.  Even miscellaneous gold stuff gets dull after awhile.  But I was really happy to have made it and I did walk through it all.  It wasn't nearly as big as I expected.  I did enjoy some of their descriptions.  They had a bowl of marble marbles, and called them marble spheres.  Very technical.  It makes you wonder what future generations will do to describe our remnant crap.  Also the museum is in a protected building.  The entire building is filled with marble.  Marble floors, marble stairs, marble walls.  They also have a lot of marble sidewalks that are in poor condition so you have to walk carefully.  Several people wiped out on the acropolis due to the marble parts of the ground. I did eat at McDonald...

Oh Americans.  I wonder about them sometimes.  The big question with fellow tourists is usually where are you from.  Simple question.  My favourite is when I tell them Canada, which confuses them.  I had one guy tell me he was from Texas, in America.  Really?  I guess some can be really unknowledgable of everything Canadian.  I feel like I should tell them I'm from Alberta and we are going to build a pipeline through their country.  Maybe then they'll know where I'm from!  Most of the tour group is pretty good and keep to themselves, and I'm fine with that.  We do have one a younger guy who has his phd in Latin.  So he knows all things roman/ Italian but nothing Greek.  So he asks questions to clarify the differences all the time.  Some of the other people were commenting on that today so it's not just me. My feet hurt so much right now,  so much.  I did so much walking.  I think I saw an impressive a...

I'm trying to keep myself awake for a bit longer.  My body thinks its 10am but the local time is 7.  But I do get a sleep in day tomorrow so that is a nice treat.  I think that is the one drawback to the bus tour.  Things are left intentionally vague.  I figured tomorrow's tour would last until late afternoon but we should be done by 1.  Would have been nice to know that ahead of time instead of scrambling to find ways to entertain me and maximize my time spent. But otherwise the tour seems exciting.  Well, I must have thought so when I booked it, but now I see the true potential.  And I like that she is giving us an early start so that we have some time to explore all the places we stay.  The last trip a lot of the tours we went straight from the bus to dinner and the city was closed when we were done.  Not that there is always a lot to see but the potential is nice. But I think it's time to retire and start fresh in the morning!

Jet lag has officially kicked in! I am finally in lovely Athens.  It seemed like it was going to be rainy but by the time I had gotten degrimed from the airplane it was a sunny and balmy 25C.  It's also so nice that they embrace the metric system here.  It's just weird seeing everything metric unlike our random system in Canada. Flight wasn't too bad.  Much to my dismay it was a plane ride from the 90's and we had no seat back entertainment.  Honestly air canada, you really expect me to watch the projection that is way too big for the screen for almost 10 hours.  So I slept.  It was a bit of a rough landing but they did warn us of the turbulence.  But I promise I'm done bitching about air canada for the moment.  It's just I'm tired and they are my biggest irritation. The Athens airport is a special place.  They actually have barricades at the customs exit to keep the people from greeting the arrivals right in the door, and there we...