Today was all about athens and I took the Exclusive Tour. It started with a brief scenic drive through the port of Piraeus and past the Temple of Olympian Zeus, Hadrian's Arch and the Statue of Lord Byron. We also drove by the Olympic Stadium that was actually used in the olympics. Unfortunately, getting photos of those things from the bus proved to be very difficult, so I opted not to show you lots of blurry photos of what may or may not be a tree in front of a statue. We arrived at the Acropolis and started up the hill.
The first stop is the facade of the Herodes Atticus which is a small theater.
Oh look... it's me with the theater behind me. Don't look for too many pictures of me, but I had to throw in the token.
This is the Temple of Athena Nike which serves as an entrance to the Acropolis. These buildings were constructed in the 5th century BC!!!
This is the Parthenon. It is currently undergoing repairs.
Originally the columns where repaired with concrete. Now they are replacing the concrete with the same marble that was originally used.
A caryatid is a sculpted female figure serving as an architectural support taking the place of a column or a pillar supporting an entablature on her head. The Greek term karyatides means "maidens of Karyae", an literally ancient town of Peloponnese. Karyai had a famous temple dedicated to the goddess Artemis in Artemis Karyatis: "As her aspect of Karyatis she rejoiced in the dances of the nut-tree village of Karyai, those Karyatides, who in their ecstatic round-dance carried on their heads baskets of live reeds, as if they were dancing plants". The best-known and most-copied examples are those of the six figures of the Caryatid Porch of the Erechtheion on the Acropolis at Athens. One of those original six figures is now in the British Museum in London. The other five figures, although they are damaged by erosion and replaced onsite by replicas, are in the Acropolis Museum.
This is the Temple of Hephaistos
We had a great view of Athens from the top.
Part of our visit to the acropolis included a lunch at a nice restaurant, the Dionysos, that has a beautiful view of the Acropolis. I was very disappointed they didn't offer us any baklava though.Afterwards we went to the Benaki Museum, the oldest museum in Greece. We were not allowed to take our cameras inside the museum. It was unfortunate because we stopped at the rooftop for coffee and there were some wonderful views.
Once we were done with lunch we headed down to the Plaka for some shopping. I picked up some nice silver jewelry from Konstantino.
And finally, this is my pup of the day. This dog was sitting here when we got to the Acropolis. Even though there were people walking all around, he was perfectly happy to lay in the sun and ignore them all.The boat left around 7pm and of course I had a date in the casino for poker shortly after. Final note... ciggarettes are evil, but I still can't stop from smoking while gambling.
