The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life you dream of.

– Oprah Winfrey

We flew into Athens on our route to Singapore and Australia, and going into it, we knew we wouldn’t have much time to spend in the country to make our timeline work.  We had a lengthy list of places we were wanting to explore, but most of those would have to wait for our next trip.  Henry and Brian really wanted to check out some of the beaches on the 6,000 islands that make up Greece.  I also wanted to go check out some of the historic sites I’ve read about in the Bible for years like Corinth, Thessalonika, and Philippi, but we chose to hold off on all of those for now.  Instead we decided to dedicate this trip to exploring Athens.  We only had spend 5 days to wander through Athens, and frankly, that just wasn’t enough.  We did our best to take it all in, but there is just so much to see and do in this tiny bit of heaven.  The little we saw was wonderful.  We were all very impressed by the friendly and kind people, the fantastic foods, the idyllic weather, and the amazing historical ruins.  I mean, really, what’s not to love about Greece?

We had found a cute little apartment for us to stay in just a short walk away from the Acropolis, and after landing at the airport and making our way through customs, we met our driver in the arrivals area.  It was a 50-minute drive to our apartment, so we had plenty of time to sit back and take in the city.  It was so lovely outside.  In the warm spring air, everything was beginning to green up and bloom, and the city had a magical feel to it.  Our driver double parked on a busy street just outside the apartment building and helped us get our bags to the stoop.  He handed us our key to get inside, and we walked inside to settle into our 5-night home.

The apartment was spacious and perfect for our stay.  Brian and I had a nice room, and Henry would be sleeping on the sofa bed in the living room.  We agreed to make that ‘his’ room so he could close the doors to the room and have a bit of privacy too.  There was also a small bathroom with a washing machine and a decent kitchen and dining room as well.  To keep our costs down, it helps if we can prepare breakfast at least, and being somewhere for a few days gives us the ability to buy more groceries in better bulk.  It doesn’t always work out for us, but this time it did.

It was dinner time, and we were all pretty worn out from the flight, but we decided to wander down the road a bit and try the Tarantino’s hamburger joint we’d found on the map.  It was only a few blocks from our apartment, and when we walked in, we wondered if it was even open.  There were four men working behind the counter, but no one was eating inside.  Starving and desperate, we grabbed a table and placed our order anyway.  The food was delicious, and we were so glad we’d tried it.  They were great burgers like we’d find at home.  We found out later that they had just opened up during the pandemic.  They filled quite a lot of take-out orders in the time that we were there, but no one else joined us in the dining room.

Afterwards we found a supermarket to get some breakfast for the following morning.  We decided that we really wanted some biscuits.  Biscuits are a truly American thing, and we haven’t found them since we left the US.  Henry requested biscuits with fried pork tenderloin for breakfast, so we tried to come up with that.  After 10 minutes of trying to figure out what the word ‘flour’ looked like in the Greek alphabet, we found what we needed to make the biscuits.  The meat was harder to come by, but we found a bag of frozen pork gyro meat that we agreed might be a good substitute. 

We crashed pretty hard when we returned to the room that night, but the next morning, we were up bright and early and ready to go explore the city.  We were at the very edge of the off-season, and the peak-season pricing would be going into effect during our stay.  We mapped out a plan for our time where we could see the more expensive sights before the pricing changed, and that meant that on this date, we would be touring the National Archeological Museum. 

We wandered through the streets taking in the sights and letting our noses lead us to some lunch.  Brian had wanted to go to the Falafel Guys restaurant he’d found down on this pedestrian street, but Henry and I couldn’t pass up this cute little pizza shop across the way from it.  We picked out our slices from several that were already made, and Brian gave in and ordered one too.  The lady at the counter cooked our individual slices for us while we waited, and then we sat down to enjoy our delicious food.

After lunch, we walked a little further until we found the museum.   It was very large, the largest in Greece, and it held hundreds of items on exhibit dating back to ancient times.  There were many old statues and grave markers dating back 2000 years, and we walked through the exhibits trying to take them all in.  The Greeks loved the human body, and there were many examples of anatomically correct models in each room.  We really enjoyed the exhibit on time where we could see the first mechanical devices that kept astronomical time. 

Walking through town, Brian and I were surprised by how many sexually explicit souvenirs were for sale right out on the street.  At every stand, there were erotic playing cards, postcards, magnets, and more with graphic images showing two or more people obviously in the act.  There were also hundreds of very colorful, almost decorative phallus-shaped bottle openers, key chains, and magnets for sale.  Sex was everywhere, but thankfully, Henry didn’t seem to notice most of it. 

We ate our dinner at a traditional Greek restaurant not too far from the apartment.  Brian loves a good gyro, so we picked this restaurant so he could have an authentic one.  Interestingly enough, gyros are quite different in Greece from those at home.  In the US, the gyro shops typically have the processed lamb or chicken kebabs, but here, it is made of shaved pork meat. Also at home, the meat and vegetables come inside a pita to make a sandwich.  In Greece, the meat and vegetables are brought out on a tray with slices of pita.  You just kind of make your sandwich as you go. It was quite delicious even if it was different.

We got up early the next morning to trek up to the Acropolis.  The Acropolis is a very tall plateau in the middle of the city that used to house the most important buildings of the ancient times.  We began our hike up the hill, and still near the bottom, we were able to see through the gates to the stage level of the Odeon of Herodes Atticus.  We bought our tickets at the nearby ticket booth, and we had the place nearly to ourselves when we began our slow trek up. 

We saw the Odeon of Herodes Atticus again once we climbed nearly to the top, this time from the upper levels.  This venue was completed in 161 AD, and I find it amazing to think that concerts are still held here.  Performances have been given from Frank Sinatra, Elton John, Sting, Diana Ross, Foo Fighters, and many more.  Although not much is left of the former glory, I imagine hearing live music in this ancient setting would be quite interesting.

There are quite a lot of buildings on the summit of this hill.

The Parthenon was an incredible sight to see.  Outside of the main structure, there were informational signs showing how much things had changed around this former temple over the past 40 years.  For many years, there was nothing here but massive piles of rubble.  Throughout history, other generations and societies have tried to reconstruct and repair these buildings, but in many cases, the people did more damage than anything else.  Archeologists have been working for 45 years to try to put the pieces back together again.  They have sorted and cataloged the thousands of pieces of enormous rock, and they have been working to identify where each one fits in the puzzle and building replacements to fill the gaps.  The buildings you see in my pictures are the result of those years of tedious labor. 

After visiting the Acropolis, we decided to walk over to Areopagus Hill.  This area is not much more than a litter-strewn rock patch that overlooks some of the surrounding valley, but in ancient times, this was a bustling shopping and market area.  Paul, as recounted in Acts 17:16-34, preached here to the crowds.  It was hard for me to stand on the hill as it is today and imagine anything like that actually happening.  I couldn’t help but wonder if that was similar to what archeologists first saw when they began excavating many of these other ruins.  I cannot help but find it amazing that people have the vision and tenacity to dig in and recreate what time and weather have destroyed.

We moved on to check out the Panathenaic Theater.  We had seen this one from the car on the way in from the airport.  For a fee, you could go in and take a tour of it, but from the sidewalk, you could get a really nice view for free.  This multi-purpose stadium is built entirely out of marble and was completed in 144 AD with a seating capacity of 50,000 spectators.  Eventually it fell into ruin, but the stadium was excavated and refurbished in 1869.  It was used for the Olympics ceremonies and events in 1870 and 1875.  It has been used for various events since then, including as an Olympic venue in the 2004 Olympic games.    

We decided to explore the more modern side of Athens the next day.  We found a local market and walked around it for a bit.  The markets are so foreign to me, even though I have been amazed to find them in almost every country we’ve visited.  This one had vendors selling everything from clothing to meat under the same roof.  We’ve gotten accustomed to seeing chicken and pig parts that we aren’t used to in the US, but this market introduced us to lambs as well.  They were a bit harder to look at, and Henry really struggled with it.  We didn’t stay at the market long because of them.

We found our way over to a toy store instead.  This was a massive three-story store full of every toy you can imagine.  Easter isn’t far away, and it was interesting to see the different customs related to the holiday here.  Apparently the lambada is a traditional Easter candle that people in Greece hold on the evening of the Holy Saturday.  These candles were everywhere!  In the toy store, there were common US toys like Legos and Barbies that all came with their own special Easter candles in the packaging.  We enjoyed looking around, and we found it funny how many toys are the exact same even on the other side of the world.   

On our way back home, we happened upon Hadrian’s Library.  Hadrian became the emperor of Rome, but he was a fan of Greece, and Athens in particular, long before that.  He donated this building to the people of Athens in 132 AD.  Originally it was 400 ft long by 260 feet wide and it housed many historic papyri and several lecture rooms.  It was destroyed in 267 AD when Athens was sacked by the Germanic Heluri people, though.      

On our last morning, our driver picked us up promptly at 11 just outside our apartment and drove us to the airport over the next hour.  She was very friendly, and we loved our conversation with her.  She was from Greece, and she obviously loved her country very much.  She had always lived in Athens, but she dreamed of one day buying a camper and moving out to one of the islands.  She said she knew it sounded crazy, but one day she was going to do it.  We never her told her about our own level of crazy, but we did encourage her to follow her dream.  After all, the biggest adventure you can take is to live the life you dream of.