Athens- Ruins, Ruins, Ruins

I was very happy to find out that JC has booked flights back to Athens, as opposed to another ferry ride! Of course, the 45 minute ride was on an actual airplane from the 80's. Hmmmm.

So we finally saw Athens in the daylight and it was really hurting. It is speckled with wonderful things but the basic infrastructure seems dated and deteriorating. On top of that, we were ready to get home and see Hayden. We decided to splurge a bit on this leg of the trip and use some rewards points to stay at the Marriott. Oh and it was glorious to stay in an amazing American style hotel bed.



Saturday's big objective was to score some tickets for the Olympicos match on Sunday. So we spent whatever remaining daylight we had metroing to the stadium and grabbing the tickets. On our way home, we jumped off the metro early and found a cute little late night market. We also happened to be close to this fabulous grill that specialized in lamb chops. So we filled ourselves up and headed back for a wonderful night of sleep.

Sunday AM we finally did the Acropolis stuff. I think when it comes to ruins, I would rather them recreate as much as possible, because I have a hard time appreciating rocks sitting on the ground. it was still cool seeing layers of history before our eyes. We then walked over to the Agora and Mars Hill. Pretty similar stuff.

JC was determined to go the National Archeological Museum. This place was years and years of recovered artifacts. We Finished it in 45 minutes.

ON TO THE SOCCER errrr.... FOOTBALL MATCH.

This was brialliant. We were seeing Greece's best and most storied club in Olympiacos. They have a recetly renovated stadium that fits 30,000 fans and I would say there was about 25,000 this Sunday evening. The place was rocking as they won the match on 2 second-half goals. It was an electric atmosphere and a definite rocomendation for anyone travelling over there.



We tried to hit up the lamb chop place on the way back but it was closed. Instead, we found this hipster joint in the same vicinity. They told me about a meat variety plate and I was game. Nothing like a huge plate of meat.



We flew home on Monday. It was long and I won't go on my how much I hate US Airways soapbox. But everything was alright when we hugged Hayden.