Athens - Arrival, Archeology Museum, Parthenon

"I think that one is our hotel." "Which one?" "That one, with the two prostitutes out front."

We arrived late at night in a somewhat seedy part of town. Our hotel seemed nice enough at first, but there was only one electrical outlet that we had to climb on the nightstand to reach. And the AC hummed incessantly. Eventually (at like 3am) we went down to reception to have it turned off. Ugh.

So it was a slow start in the morning, made slower by discussion of moving and laundry.

In the early afternoon we went to the Archeology Museum, which was great. They had wonderful statuaries ranging from the most ancient which looked very Egyptian, up through Roman. There was also a gallery with the very impressive finds from Mycenae, starting with the Mask of Agamemnon, which I'm sure you will all recognize, along with a wonderful collection of jewelry and gold leaf. Upstairs was a wonderful array of pottery, and at the back was a bronze collection including pieces of what seems to have once been a geared astronomical clock, a good 1500 years ahead of anything else similar.

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

We took so long at the museum that we found ourselves in a big rush to get to the acropolis, since we thought we wanted at least 3-4 hours there before closing time at 7pm. Well, it was a bit of a let down after Paestum. As promised, there were cranes and a lot of scaffolding, though less than there might have been. The Parthenon is in pretty bad shape. The Caryatid porch was smaller than it seemed in class, and they are doing work in the ceiling, so it wasn't that picturesque. The temple of Athena Nike was completely scaffolded-in. The entry gate, the one building up there you get to go into, however, was pretty amazing.

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

The day really made me think of my high school Humanities teacher, Mrs. Mortland. I'd like to tell her about visiting the wonderful places I learned about in her class. She asked us to keep in touch and gave us her email address right before graduation, but it was her address at the school and she has moved on to somewhere else. Even google doesn't know how to find her.

On the way down the hill we stopped to see a variety of minor ruins.

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

From Athens

We could see this temple in the distance. Should try to go over to it tomorrow.

From Athens

In the evening we walked through the districts of Plaka and Monastiraki, which are supposed to be some of the nicest in Athens. This strikes us as not a great sign for the city. They weren't that nice.