National Archaeological Museum of Athens

Today is a gray and drizzly day in Athens. Lauren also was up much of the night and unfortunately is not feeling well. So we thought we would take it easy and took a cab over to the National Archaeological Museum. It was neat to see the items that were found in all of the sites that we saw yesterday and to learn a bit more about Greek history. Now we'll take it easy the rest of today so that Lauren can get some rest and we can get ready to head home tomorrow.

The Sites of Athens, Part ΔΥΟ (Two)

This morning (Friday) after breakfast we headed out to see the remaining sites in Athens on our multi-site ticket. We visited Keramikos (an ancient graveyard), the ancient agora, Roman agora and Hadrian's library. Some of these structures are very well maintained such as the Hephaisteion in the background of this picture and others are reduced to fields of rocks. There are many restoration efforts going on, but Italy has done a much better job of maintaining and restoring their historical sites. One of the other interesting parts of Athens is that there are a LOT of dogs that just seem to be roaming around. Many of them have collars and look to be well fed, in many cases fat, so we assume that they are pets and the culture here allows them to roam around town. Our trip has been a lot of fun but we are starting to get ready to come home. We plan to relax during our last day here tomorrow, which is especially necessary as Lauren has started to feel a bit sick today.

The sites of Athens

We arrived in Athens Wednesday afternoon. We checked in to our hotel, which is wonderful, and decided to take a walk in to the city center and towards Plaka, which is the historic district of Athens. It's a very neat part of the city and really is the tourist center of the city. Also, all the well known monuments in Athens are right around this area. We started Thursday morning with a walk to the Acropolis where we saw the Parthenon (pictured above), Erectheion and The Temple of Athena Nike. We then visited Hadrian's Arch, the Theater of Dionysus, the Temple of Olympian Zeus, Panathianiko Stadium (the stadium for the first modern Olympics in 1896), the Congress building and Parliment building. Since these sites were all so close to one another, we were finished with site seeing by lunch. At lunch we finally had some authentic Greek dessert: baklavah! I think we both enjoy the authentic Italian dessert, gelato, more. We also visited a little liqueur and ouzo bar where we both had a small class of flavored liqueur made right there in the bar. It was a really neat place because the high walls were lined in hundreds of colorful bottles of liquers. In the evening, we took a cablecar up to the top of Lycabettus Hill, the tallest hill in Athens.

Relaxing in Corfu

Monday and Tuesday we did a lot of relaxing in Corfu. With thunderstorms expected most of the week, the weather outlook wasn't looking great when we arrived. However, about mid-day Monday the sun broke through and we only had one short rain shower during our stay. The bungalow shown above was our room at the hotel and it really wasn't very nice. Though, the hotel had a very nice pool, probably the best one in the area, so we spent most of our day Tuesday just laying by the pool. We also took a couple of strolls through the town of Dassia and had a wonderful lunch and dinner there. Neither of us knew that we would enjoy Greek food so much.

Trains, Boats and Cabs

We spent all of the day on Sunday traveling. We had three different trains to get from Salerno to Brindisi where we caught a ferry to head over to Corfu. We got into our hotel in Corfu about 9:30 am on Sunday. This was just enough time to grab breakfast at the hotel which was REALLY good. Unfortunately when we arrived it was raining and the forecast didn’t look good for the next few days. However later in the day it cleared up and we were able to get out and spend some time on the beach, it turns out that our cab driver was right when he said “you see the sun today, no problem”. If the weather cooperates we’ll have one more day on the beach today and then off to Athens on Wednesday morning.

Hurricane?

After our day hiking we thought we would relax on Saturday at our hotel in Raito. We thought we would spend this day by the pool, but the weather did not cooperate. With breakfast in our stomachs we headed back to the room and started organizing for the day. We noticed that it was getting pretty dark outside the window and difficult to see. Pretty soon you couldn’t see more then about 50 feet out the window and the wind was blowing so hard that the door to our balcony was pushed back off the seal and water started coming in under the door from the rain. We stuck a towel down there and went back to looking out the window as branches went flying by. When we saw the chair from the deck two stories down go flying by UP the hill we thought maybe we should get away from the window. About this time the alarm in the hotel went off and we headed out to the stairwell where there were no windows. Once we were in the stairwell the storm had passed but it was a pretty exciting few minutes. Luckily everybody was ok, but the hotel suffered a fair amount of damage. A couple of large picture windows were broken and every one of their glass table tops were smashed along with a few of the large patio umbrellas. We spent most of the day just hanging out in the room and on our balcony, although we did make a trip up to the spa (hot tub type pool, but with cooler water, sauna, steam room).

Vesuvius

After we exited Pompeii we decided to head up to Vesuvius. Although it was more expensive we ended up hiring a driver to take us up to the top and were VERY glad we did in the end. It was nice to not have to wait on a group and also needed to be taken back down to a different train station to get back to Salerno. It was about a 20 minute drive each way up to the Vesuvius site. Once there we hiked at a pretty quick pace and were at the top in 15 minutes. We then spent some time enjoying the view of Naples and checking out the crater. We then took some pictures and leisurely strolled back down to our cab.

Pompei

On our first day in Raito (Friday) we decided to head up to Pompeii and check out the ruins. We caught a bus down to Salerno and then a train up to Pompeii. It was an easy trip and we were in Pompeii pretty early. The trains and the buses run a LOT in the mornings. Pompeii was really cool to see. Lauren and I had visited an exhibit at the Minnesota Science Museum last year that described life in Pompeii and showed us many of the traveling artifacts from the site. So with that information already in our minds, it was really neat to then be able to walk through the space and imagine what life was like when all those items were in use in that place. We also thought it was really good that we had the information from the MN Science Museum since the Pompeii site was mostly the buildings and not really any of the artifacts. I wonder if at other times they have some of those things out because much of that stuff was stacked on shelves and locked up so you could see it a bit on the way by, but it would be really neat for them to setup a home as it looked before the explosion. We both really enjoyed this day.

Internet Troubles

Sorry for the delays in posting on the blog, it’s been quite hard for us to get internet at the last couple of stops. In Raito it was supposed to be included with the room, but their internet didn’t work and we were stuck using the internet on the TV so only quickly checked e-mail. Now in Corfu it works well but it’s very expensive, about $12 for one hour. I knew this would be the case ahead of time, but it worked so well in Rome and of course we are both used to fast free internet at the hotels we stay at in the US.

Search for a straigtening iron

Planning our morning after breakfast we decided that we would visit a few sights on our way to Rome Termini where we thought we might be able to find a voltage converter. We stopped by Quirinale (Parliament), Santa Maria degli Angeli and the Piazza delia Repubblica. The church was really interesting as it was designed by Michelangelo and built into the side of a hill. After this we were quite close to Rome Termini and wandered around asking people for a voltage converter, we found a couple but they were only good to 45 watts. Finally when we were about to leave we found a straigtening iron for 30 Euro. With our staightening iron in hand we were finally ready for lunch. After lunch we rested a bit and then visited the Piazza di Spagna and Piazza Navona. On our way to the Piazzas we stoped into a bakery and Lauren had a couple of small pastieries. This was her favorite part of the trip so far, especially the "chocolate filled boat" pastry. Finally after a long day we relaxed and had a drink at the rooftop bar. Now we are off for our last dinner in Rome.

The Vatican

Today (Tuesday) we visited the Vatican and Castel Sant'Angelo. We spent most of the day at the Vatican, visiting St. Peter's square, St. Peter's Basilica, the papal tombs, and the Vatican museum which included the Sistine Chaple. Lauren's favorite part was climbing to the top of the dome at St. Peter's Basilica, despite the hot and humid climb up 320 stairs thjrough a very small and slanted stairwell. After lunch we visited Castel Sant'Angelo which was a built originally for the Emperor Hadrian and then was used as a residence and castle for medieval popes. It was very neat to walk around in, plus it offered great views of the Vatican and Rome from the top of the castle. This picture was taken atop the castle and you can see the Vatican's St. Peter's Basilica just to the right of Erik's head. And to finish the day, Lauren lost all use of her 170W straightening iron due to our electric converter only being good for 85W and less and the fuses being blown. Lauren will have to continue the trip with curly hair…OH NO! According to Erik, luckily, all of the important electronics (like computers) take 220 Volts.

Colosseum

On Monday we visited a number of the Roman empire sites. We started with the forum and palatine hill then visited the Colosseum. We ended the day by visiting a couple of churches, Saint Ignazio and San Clemente. San Clemente has been excavated below to allow you to visit an ancient christian church on the first level down and a pagan church at the lowest level. We ended the day with another nice meal on one of the side streets by the hotel and of course some gelato.

Arriving in Rome

We made it into Rome yesterday (Sunday) in the afternoon. The flight was a bit late but it was a pretty uneventful one. Both Lauren and I slept pretty well on the plane which made the trip and staying up to a "normal" bed time easier. The cab driver dropped us off on a busy street and pointed us down an allyway to the hotel which was a bit odd, but it was clearly a tourist area so we headed down the ally and found our hotel just a few feet away. Our hotel is only a couple of minutes walk to the Pantheon in one direction and Trevi Fountain in the other direction. We visited both yesterday as well as the only Gothic church in Rome, Santa Maria alla Minerva. We ended the day by eating dinner in the Piazza in front of the Pantheon and getting some Gelato on the way home. It was a great start to our Honeymoon.