June 1, Wednesday The wake-up call came at 6:00AM, however, everyone pretended they didn’t hear it, and no one moved until 6:15. But even with this slow start, by 7:00AM they were having coffee, tea, yogurt, sausages, scrambled eggs, smoked salmon, and sliced tomatoes in the Windjammer, and they disembarked the ship before 8:00AM. Once again, they had decided to skip paying 90 Euros each for a guided tour, and, instead to venture out into a foreign land using the ordinary means of transportation employed by the locals. There was some trouble with the engine of the shuttle from Port B, where the Royal Caribbean landed, and Port A, from which it is possible to walk to the Piraeus Metro Station. So, they waited in the shade for perhaps 10 minutes, and when the shuttle engine was fixed, took the 10 minute ride. Exiting the bus, they walked and walked and walked and walked through crowded, noisy Greek streets, asking questions of vendors, asking directions from anyone carrying a camera (and thus a tourist). Finally, they located the Metro station, and bought six tickets—3 for the trip “out” and 3 for the “return.” Eli overheard a British couple getting advice from a local about which stops to use and they followed this couple who got off at Syntagma, transferred to a new line and finally exited at Acropoli.
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| LT in front of Theater of Atticus. |
This left them with only a few hundred yards to walk until they saw the Acropolis (which means “high city”) which is perched high atop a stone outcropping—like a huge rectangle 300-400 feet above the rest of the land. As they approached the entrance, they walked by the back or “stage” end of the ruined Theater of Dionysius and the restored Theater of Herodes Atticus.
The Acropolis had opened at 8:00AM, and it was now just past 10:00AM and the lines and crowds were quite daunting. They stood in a long line about 15 minutes to get tickets. Then they stood in another crowd—shaped like a wide triangle, as hundreds of ticket-holders (including, of course, large pre-arranged tour groups following a leader with a raised umbrella or round sign with a number on it) tried to funnel through a six foot gate with two ticket-takers. The crowd was polite and orderly, but it packed like a rugby “scrum.” Later in the day, at lunch in the Plaka, they met a British couple who had actually been so dispirited by the crowds around the entry gates that they gave up and walked back down the hill, determined to see some less crowded Athenian ruins. But the Thomases persevered, with Allie holding on to LT’s shirt, and Eli employing her New York manners, and they got through the narrow gate and began walking up the stone steps towards the Propylaia with its Ionic columns—the first structures through which one enters the Acropolis.
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| Erecthium (with Caryatids) at entrance to Acropolis |
Since the Acropolis sticks straight up in the middle of Athens, there is a 360 degree view of the entire city from the top. There were huge cranes working on parts of the front of the Doric columns of the Parthenon, but when they got to the “back” they enjoyed a perfect view of eight Doric columns, topped by a pediment where they could see a horse head at one end of the triangle, and a horse-rider at the other end. The rest of the sculptures for the pediment, of course, are in the British Museum, which LT and Allie had visited back in April. There was a clear blue sky, and they stopped to take many real and many imaginary photographs of this ancient historical building which symbolizes so much of Western culture. The “ground” is all stone atop the Acropolis, so it is like walking around the mountaintops in Yosemite, and they had to watch their footing as they wove through the crowds, stepped around puddles of water, avoided sharp, treacherous stones and tried to make headway towards other landmarks such as the Erectheum with its 5 lady cariatids who support the marble roof over their heads. It was wonderful to actually be walking around buildings which philosophers like Socrates and Plato, dramatists such as Sophocles, Aeschylus, and Euripides, and statesmen like Pericles knew and wrote about. They could see all the way to the Saronic Gulf, though they couldn’t actually make out the port of Piraeus.
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| LT and Allie in the Plaka |
It was only going to get more crowded atop the high city, so descending from the Acropolis, they wandered around the side streets and saw the many ruined columns of Hadrian’s Library, the ancient Roman Agora and the 8-sided Octagonal Wind and Water clock. Helped by another Greek, the got directions to the Plaka—3 blocks away—found Adrianou street, walked up it a bit and located an appealing taverna or “esteritorio” where the proprietor let them select a cool interior table in a corner. They ate creamy, tasty eggplant salad spooned onto crisp fresh break, Greek salad (tomatoes, cucumbers, Feta cheese, and a small amount of lettuce), fried calamarakia, moussaka, washed down with a litre of cold white wine. The waiters were friendly and prompt, and the downstairs bathroom was clean. Everything was terrific. It was here that they met the couple who had given up when they saw the huge crowds outside the entry gates to the Parthenon.
At 2:00PM, they left the restaurant and did some shopping. They knew if they kept drifting left and stayed on Adrianou street, they would eventually run into the Monastiraki Metro station, from which they could get a straight (no transfer) Metro train to the Piraeus stop. Allie bought a bracelet, and Eli found a long-coveted “engraving” of Athens the way it looked in the 1800’s. Adrianou street is like the Rodeo Drive of Athens, with trendy shops and inviting restaurants on both sides, but by the time they reached and began walking down Ermou street—on which the Monastiraki Station was located—they were once again on a noisy, crowded, chaotic Greek street. It was like the ancient, peaceful, artistic Greek dream had ended and they were back in the hurly burly chaotic reality of present-day Greek life. After asking directions from several helpful shop keepers, they located the station, used their “return” tickets and were back at the Piraeus station in about 15 minutes.
Then, threading their way through small vendors and curb-parked cars, they made the long, hot walk back (on more noisy, traffic-filled streets) along the port to Embarkation Point A, from which they could take the shuttle back to the “Navigator of the Seas” at Point B. Once aboard the ship, they climbed from level 1 to level 9, deposited their treasures, and then went to Windjammer for refreshments. Allie had 3 glasses of water/lemonade and LT poured down 5 glasses until he felt normal again. It was great to be back on the ship. LT hopes that when he and Allie read their next Greek play—perhaps Sophocles’ “Antigone,”-- they’ll be able to think back on this trip to the city in which it was first performed. It would have cost us almost 300 Euros to do this if we had bought a Royal Caribbean “tour.” Instead, we paid less than 8 Euros for our round-trip Metro tickets and 36 Euros for our entry into the Acropolis—a grand total of 44 Euros instead of 300.
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| View from the deck |
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