August 31
We arrive at the airport and are greeted by about a 50 army men all in their uniforms, looking very fine and dandy...so Lisa and i sat for about 30mins until we had to go board our flight, and took in the 'scenery', mmm...haha...
The plane boarded about 10-15 mins late, but we didn't think anything of it until we had taken our seats but the plane didn't move...then over the loud speaker the captain comes over and says the control tower has informed him that because of the high traffic we can either use half a runway to take off, or wait an hour...i wanted to yell out use half the run way! but instead he chose to wait an hour...man, not cool...waiting one hour on a plane and not being able to get off...although we didn't have too much to complain about, because we didn't have to catch a connecting flight like some people which they were def going to miss!
Finally arrive in Athens and is quite an easy trip from the airport into the city...the trip from the city to our hostel was not quite as easy and Lisa and i were well and truly ready for a rest once we had found where we were...(again, cities in Europe really need to invest in signs!). It started to rain not long after and so we decided a trip to the cinemas was in order and saw "I hate Valentines Day".
September 1 (despite Lisa writing in her journal 32/08/09)
Because we were itching to get to Santorini, we decided to do the Hop on, Hop off bus tour to try and see Athens in one day. Mission accomplished!
Just as with Rome, if you imagined the ruins as buildings the places would have been huge! Mostly everything was made of marble and a bit of limestone.
We drove past the stadium where the first modern Olympics were held. Very well preserved and all made of white stone, and was a pretty awesome sight for our first trip through Athens.
We jumped off the bus at the Acropolis and scaled the mountainside to the top and the view of Athens was pretty damned amazing, as was the Acropolis! A lot of the structure had netting and scaffolding on it, as they are trying to restore it to how it was way back when.
Back on the bus and our next jump off was at the National Archaelogical museum. Lisa was very excited to see the gold death mask of Agamemnon - who is the guy that took over Troy with the big horse filled with people.
The museum was pretty small, but had lots of items made out of gold, and the jewellery was pretty damn awesome, even some pieces that i would like for my collection!
Kinda happy that we got to see basically all of Athens in one day...not my fav city, is very old and run down and lots of 'commission' style houses from when there was a big population influx into Athens that they had to accommodate quickly. Plus everyone is so damn rude!!! Somebody forgot to add onto their customer service description that you need to provide customer service and preferably with a smile, or at least recognising that you are speaking to someone...not cool! Know i realise why they say Australians are nice...because we actually treat people with respect! and use please and thankyou! lol...
September 2
Today we have caught the metro to Piraeus and booked ourselves a seat on a ferry leaving at 12midnight getting into Santorini tomoz at 11.30am. There was a ferry that left this morning at 8am, but we missed it by about 3 hours, haha!
So, spending our time catching up on emails and being a tourist...can't wait for the crystal clear beaches at Santorini! YAY!
