Friday 14th June
We were up with bright eyes and bushy tails as today we're heading to Greece!
We packed ourselves up and had arranged to get a transfer from the apartment to the airport because the public transport to the airport seemed a bit strange and we couldn't guarantee that we would get there on time especially this early in the morning.
We arrived at Belgrade Airport nice and early and breezed through check in, once again having to carry our packs to the oversize baggage carousel!
The airport was empty at this hour in the morning so we just hung out near the gate and had our breakfast bikkies. The security here is at the gate, so as time got closer to our flight it started to get much busier and slightly chaotic with large families all 'lining up' for security to open to get through the gate. Our flight ended up being a bit delayed because they were doing thorough checks of everyones passports and documents of people getting off the plane that we were then going to get on. It was very interesting to watch. Serbian nationals got let through without a passport check and everyone else had to queue up directly outside of the plane and passports were checked carefully with magnifying glasses.
We eventually boarded our Aegean Airlines plane, that's right, we're flying in stlye today ladies and gentlemen! We're flying on the national Greek airline which was pretty cool! Wow! It was the best airline that we've flown with! It was fantastic! The seats were spacious, the staff were really friendly, and we got snacks!!! Lots of snacks!! We were given a sandwich, a chocolate bar, and a drink!! What a day! Greece here we come!
A short while later we started our decent and the countryside was beautiful! We flew past some of the closer greek islands which looked stunning, and as we flew over the mainland we saw the classic mediterranean fields with the different shades from green to brown interspersed with olive trees, it was beautiful! I was surprised by how almost barren and dry it looked, I expected it to be much more lush! It reminded me alot of Spain.
We landed, grabbed our bags and headed out of the airport to find the train station. Like most cities we've been to, airports always seem to be a long way out of the city, so we'd done our research beforehand and found that the train was the best option to get into the city and then to our accommodation. Well, Athens had other plans for us. When I ducked into the bathroom, I heard an announcement that said no trains were running today! We looked it up and yep, sure enough, there was a train strike! What are the chances?!
Ok, bus it is then. We lined up with everyone else from the airport to buy our bus tickets, and after an exchange with the grumpy, impatient ticket man, we figured out which bus we needed, which fortunately was not the main bus that most people were waiting for. One of the things we'd read about the bus is that it is a bit of a free for all, there's no queue to get on and its packed, so push your way on and get a seat if you can. So we were all geared up ready to fight to get on this bus, so after a very stressful boarding of the bus, where we did manage to get seats and it wasn't quite as packed as we thought it would be, it was quite an alright 1.5hour journey into the city. It was incredibly hot though, we were wet with sweat by the time we got off!
First bus done and now actually in the city of Athens, we got off and figured out the local buses to take us to our accommodation. We couldn't figure out how to buy tickets but once we got on we found out that it was free because of the strike! A really kind guy that could see that we were obviously tourists explained to us that there was a strike and told us where to get off because we couldn't read or speak the name because it's all in a completely different alphabet!! When we'd gotten on we had to show the driver the address on the phone to make sure it was the right bus!
We got off the bus at our stop and decided to just walk the rest of the way instead of waiting for the next bus because it was honestly too hot on them! It wasn't too much further anyway.
Ok, well, all I can say is I hope the islands are nicer than Athens. It felt like we'd stepped into a third world country. Everything seemed so primitive, dirty, and just poverty stricken. It was so dirty, there was rubbish and just filth all over the ground and walls, the buildings looked like slums, and the roads didn't seem finished, ok there was asphalt which is more than Croatia had in many places, but there were no road lines, the edges hadn't been finished and there are obviously zero road rules here. None of the properties look cared for, the people seem abrupt and there are unhealthy looking street cats roaming around what looks like abandoned plots and weaving through the piles of rubbish on the street. I think a lot of it comes down to how old Athens is. It is such an old place with such a dense population, I guess they just haven't had the upkeep or the advancements? I'm sure there are parts that are nicer, but at least for this area that's my impression.
We arrived at our apartment and were met by the host, it's a good apartment for what we need for a couple of nights, although the host profusely apologised that when he arrived just before us to check the place, he found that the toilet had exploded and toilet water was covering the toilet and bathroom floor! Really not helping with how I feel about Athens at this point! He was very good about it and had someone come and fix it straight away and had it all cleaned up, so that wasn't a problem.
My biggest shock though was that you can't flush toilet paper down the toilet! There was an open bin next to the toilet to put paper in! Gross! Yuckkkkkkkk! Ewwww! Nooooo thankyouuuu! No one ever tells you that when they talk about Greece! Apparently it's because the piping in Greece is so old that it's too thin/small for toilet paper to go down and it just clogs it. It's ok, it's just two nights, just two nights for a poo paper bin. Really not helping with the whole Athens is really dirty impression though.
We were starving at this point so headed out to a little local place that our host recommended for lunch. It was a really nice small family run cafe/ kebab bar kind of place just down the road. We both had a traditional gyros for our first Greek meal and omg it was incredible!! It was so tasty!!
After we'd had lunch we spent a bit of time chilling out in the aircon of the apartment looking at what we wanted to do in Athens tomorrow. Later on we popped down the road to find a supermarket to pick up something for dinner (we figured it was probably a bit too soon to go back for another gyros!). We found a traditional spinach pastry dish that my greek friend from uni had said we had to try and brought that back to chuck in the oven for dinner.
We had a chill evening and an early night after our early start and what felt like a big day!
Saturday 15th June
We headed out for the day to explore Athens!
It was another 41degree day today which seemed to be exacerbated by being in the throngs of a super dense city!
I'll be straight up honest with you, neither of us liked Athens very much, the city itself is just dirty and busy, there's people hassling you every step you take, trying to get you to buy something, or trying to wrap a bracelet on your wrist and then make you pay for it. We both just felt very uncomfortable and it was a shock to the system after being in Croatia for six weeks where we felt 100% safe the entire time and everyone was lovely to us. This was the first place since Italy where we constantly had our hands on our pockets making sure our phones and wallet were still there and just didn't feel comfortable. If there weren't people hassling you there were beggars, even on the trains. Honestly the closest place I can describe it as is Cambodia. All that aside, we enjoyed what we actually did in Athens, so let me take you through our day.
We went down to the gyros place and bough a gyros each to bring into the city to have for lunch. The family running the place are so lovely, and whether it's because they recognised us or what but they gave it to us cheaper today! The trains were back up and running again, so we took the metro into the city centre. The metro system is actually really good! It's on time, the trains are nice and they're all air-conditioned!
We arrived into the main area of Athens and stood in the main square outside the metro station eating our lunch. It was delish once again. It was incredibly hot though and even standing in the shade didn't offer any kind of reprieve. I was starting to struggle with not being able to get the slightest bit cooler at all! While we were having our lunch a man walked past from back in time, he had a a pair of headphones on that was attached to the stereo he was carrying!
We walked around the main square, Monastiraki, which was situated at the bottom of the hill where the Acropolis stood. It was so busy and like the squares in Italy with scammers all around. In the square was a cool Ottoman mosque, Tzistarakis Mosque, from 1759.
From the square we wandered around some bustling streets lined with markets which was pretty cool and came upon the Ancient Agora of Athens.
The other thing here is that they charge for absolutely everything. We got used to being able to wander up to stuff and walk through ruins etc. in Croatia as they're all just publicly accessible. But of course being a major destination you have to pay to see and do everything and anything, and it wasn't a small amount of money either! Luckily for us though you could see everything from outside of the paid area, so unless you really wanted to walk amongst it, we got to see it all!
The thing that I find so fascinating is that these amazing historic structures don't stand by themselves to be awed, they're just part of the city, there is a railway track that literally runs right by the agora and there is housing, shops, etc. all around it, it's really strange, just like it was plonked in the middle of the city, in reality though I guess the city was just built around it!
We then wandered back round to the square and to the Hadrians Library, which was cool. It's just hard to comprehend how old these structures, or remains of structures are, and to imagine civilisation back then.
From here we meandered to the Roman Agora which were quite pretty ruins.
We passed a couple of really cool churches on our way up the hill to the Acropolis.
The climb up to the Acropolis was really nice, although we were both struggling with how hot it was. It was really nice and a bit calmer to be out of the main bustling, intense square now that we were hiking up the hill. Oh and there's cats everywhere!
The view looking back over Athens was absolutely insane, it is so dense and is just a sea of white buildings! It was just overwhelming to look at! It is such a dense sprawl that just keeps going and going, a sea is the only way to describe it!
We made it to the top of the hill which was my favourite part of Athens. There weren't many people up here and it was a fun climb. The path through the bush only took us so far and then it opened up to a rocky top so we had to scramble and climb our way up the rocks to get to the very top. Then the view was great, on one side was the insane sprawl of Athens and on the other was the amazingly ancient Acropolis and Parthenon! There was also a little breeze this high up and out of the city which I was so thankful for. From up here we could also see the agora and the other sites that we'd just walked around as well which was cool!
The other thing with all the ancient structures here is that they're all being restored in some way, so most of the sites had scaffolding over part of it and actually a lot of the stone work wasn't the original stone, it was the stone that they'd put in when they restored it.
I really enjoyed it up here just looking out at everything, and being in a bit of a quieter area. And there's no denying that it's pretty special to get to see such ancient structures. It's fascinating to think about their civilisations.
After marvelling at it all and appreciating a bit of a break from the madness of Athens below us, and Sam being a photographer for someones photoshoot we made our way back down the rock and the hill to see if we could get closer to the Acropolis and Parthenon. We followed a path up the hill round the other side and came to the main entrance to the acropolis, but couldn't get any closer without paying, but to be honest, you wouldn't see the whole thing by actually going up to it, and a lot of it was under scaffolding, I think we got more out of it by being able to see so much of it up on our rocky hill!
We made our way back down the hill and to a part of town called Plaka, which is a neighbourhood in Athens with a village feel to it and meant to be the nicer part of Athens. It's at the bottom of the hill on the other side of the Acropolis and its temples, with cobbled streets and small shops selling jewellery, clothing and local arts. In amongst that were gelato shops and family run restaurants. It was much nicer than the rest of Athens that we've seen, albeit still very touristy. It was really nice walking around here, but I was really struggling with the heat at this point and feeling quite sick, so we tried to find some shade to rest in for a bit.
We heard that the Acropolis museum is really good, so we decided now was a good time to go over and have a look at it! We spent a good few hours in there, and I was slowly restored thanks to the aircon blasting inside! I think I'd just gotten way too hot and couldn't cool down!
The museum was amazing, it was so well done! It has to be the highlight of Athens. There were so many artefacts and it gave a really good history of Athens and Greece through time, as well as the specifics of each artefact, I feel like I got a much greater understanding from it. All the statues and stone work were amazing as well, I loved the statues of the women looking like they have silk flowing off them, but really it's stone, and they're the pillars holding up the structures! It helped that it was air-conditioned as well! We spent hours exploring through here, and I think the coolest part was learning all the history about the Acropolis and its temples and then being able to look out the big glass windows and see the Acropolis up on its hill and being able to directly relate everything we were learning. You could really visualise it all and imagine life back then! It was fantastic!
Now that we were feeling revived, we headed back to Plaka to have a better explore and enjoy it more, it is a really nice part of Athens!
We then walked our way across town to the Olympic stadium!
It was amazing to be where the first Olympics were held! Ah the atmosphere was great, I love the Olympics, I was just so excited, it was definitely my favourite part of the day!
From the excitement of the Olympic stadium we headed back across to find the nearest train station to take us back to our apartment for some dinner, a cold drink, and bed!
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