Trip to Greece, Day 2

Trip to Greece Athens, Monday, April 5 Our hotel, the Best Western Athens Gate, was right on Syngrou Avenue, directly across the street from the remains of the Temple of Zeus. The site is walled off, so you can't see much but the tops of the pillars from the street, but the garden at the top of the hotel had a fantastic view of both that and the Acropolis in the opposite direction. If I were to go back to Athens, I probably wouldn't stay in this particular hotel again. The rooms were clean, serviceable, and had a view of the Acropolis from the balconies. The location right on the Plaka is fantastic. Unfortunately, for the price, things seemed a bit "tired" and it was quite noisy. I'm not complaining here primarily about the street traffic, either--the problem was more to do with the large number of tour groups obviously made up of high school or college-aged kids, none of whom seemed to be aware that when one is returning to one's hotel at 2:00 in the morning, one should not be talking at the top of the lungs as if it were mid-day! We also joked that there were so many Americans in the place, it would make a great target for a terrorist attack! Now, I have to say that during the entire time we were in Greece, we never felt remotely threatened for being Americans or felt there was any danger of a terrorist attack. It's somewhat ironic, then, that almost exactly a month after we got home, there were some bombings in Athens.	Zeus Temple from the hotel's rooftop garden The Acropolis from the hotel's rooftop garden
After having breakfast in the hotel--a very nice buffet with the best brewed coffee we had during the trip--we went out to climb the Acropolis. The photos tell most of the story. (Vernon's not in most of them because he was in the backpack on Daddy's back!)
Pnyx Hill, where the Athenian Ekklesia met and voted	Looking up at the Acropolis from the main entry
The Nike Temple, and part of the Propylaea	Procession up to the Propylaea
We take a break during the climb	First view of the Parthenon
Looking down on the Herod Atticus Theater	Another view of the Parthenon

View down towards the Plaka

Corner of the Parthenon

Front of the Parthenon

Side of the Parthenon with crane in view

I was disappointed to find nearly all of the structures so obscured by scaffolding. When I was in Athens in 1986, there was not nearly as much scaffolding or other evidence of reconstruction and conservation efforts as there is now. And that surprised me, because I had thought they would be mostly done--if not completely done--by now. But then, I should have realized we are talking about Mediterranean people here, and they never seem to do anything with particular alacrity. Of course, that's what makes visiting Mediterranean countries so relaxing! Americans could learn a lot from their more laid-back attitude. We noticed a sign indicating that the project was begun in 1983, now more than 20 years ago. This means it's taking them longer to do the conservation/reconstruction than it did to build the structures the first time around, despite modern equipment! There's an irony in that, but it also explains why they don't seem to be ready for the Olympics, either.

We did the Acropolis Museum in shifts, since the kids weren't particularly interested and it was very crowded. I did take Vernon in with me and started to nurse him when he got fussy. To my surprise, a museum employee told me I wasn't "allowed" to "do that" in the museum. I thought about making a fuss over it, but decided that since I wasn't in the US and didn't speak the language, it would probably be pointless to argue.

One thing that's worth noting at this point is that most of the artwork in the Acropolis Museum predates the extant buildings on the Acropolis. The majority of the art from the Classical period of the Acropolis is now in the British Museum, Lord Elgin having absconded with them. (The primary exception is the Caryatids--columns carved in the shape of a woman--from the Erechtheion, which are in the Museum, having been replaced in the building itself by modern copies.) Most of the other works, however, are from the Archaic period and the buildings that were destroyed by the Persians in the late 5th century. The Greeks always buried any religious objects that were considered too damaged to display, and this has been a great boon to modern archaeologists.

Another thing that I like to point out to people when they're looking at photos of ancient Greek sculpture is to remember that they would have been very brightly painted. The paint is still visible on many of the sculptures pictured below, but the brightness of the original colors probably isn't obvious. For example, what looks like black was, in fact, either bright green or bright blue.

An archaic lion

The famous "three-bodied daemon"

The famous "kouros carrying a calf"

A lovely example of an archaic kore

Athena, from an early temple pediment

An amazingly lifelike archaic sculpture of a dog	Hangin' out in the museum courtyard
Grandma Katie, Aurora and Vernon relax in the shade	Dad and kids with the Erechtheon in the distance
By the time we'd finished up with the Acropolis, it was late afternoon and time for lunch. This meant, unfortunately, that we didn't have time to take in the ruins in the ancient Agora, since the sites in Athens all close at 2:30 or 3:00 (ridiculously early, in my opinion). That's too bad, since the Temple of Hephaistos in the Agora is one of the best-preserved ancient temples anywhere and I'd have liked to see it again. But, that just gives us an excuse to go back again in the future! Go to Tuesday, April 6

Trip to Greece

Athens, Monday, April 5