Day 1- Arrival to Paris
To get to Athens, Erin, Sara and I had to take a 5 hour train ride to Paris and spend the night there so we could be ready for our too early flight to Athens in the morning. But my trip actually started when we made it to the train station with much time to spare since Sgt. Erin was in charge. When we got onto the train, we spent close to 15 minutes just looking for the right car we were supposed to be in, and pretty soon we were at the end of the train, I had motion sickness and we decided to just seat ourselves...in first class. Erin assured us that no one would check our tickets and that the only time we would even be addressed at all would be for something "inconsequential." So after an hour and a half, we got our "inconsequential" request for me to remove my feet from the seat ahead of me followed by us being kicked out of first class 7 minutes later and sent to the complete other end of the train.
When we arrived in Paris, we congratulated each other on being intelligent and not taking fixed priced cars and choosing a nice taxi to take us to the Hilton. Unfortunately for us, our cab driver kept passing the exit for the Hilton and the price kept rising. We kept telling him, "il y a une signe..." (there's a sign) but he just kept going in random directions. He found it finally and took some money off our payment for getting lost, but by the time we stepped foot inside the Hilton, which was like a little American Embassy, we had already missed dinner and we were starving. Erin and I settled for a nice "Tree Grows in Brooklyn" dinner consisting of a stale Special K bar from a machine, half a clementine, half a coca-lite, and 3/4 cup of coffee. We finished our wild night watching Scrubs in French, understanding none of it, but keeping it on because we were so excited to be in the presence of a television.
Day 2- Arrival to Athens
The next morning, Sgt Erin Pames Bond had us up and running bright and early for breakfast, and by some miracle of God and all the rules of an American hotel franchise, we were treated to a breakfast fit for American kings. I'm talking Heinz ketchup without the extra added vinegar, Skippy Peanut Butter, Maple syrup, salted butter, scrambled eggs and sausage were only some of the highlights that we have been missing oh so much. So naturally, we ate all we could and smuggled some for later.
Our flight to Athens was about 3 1/2 hours, the peak of which was when I ate a pain au chocolate I stole from breakfast with some Skippy peanut butter. When we finally reached the ground and I stepped off the plane and onto one of the most beautiful countries with some of the richest history, I breathed deep to take it all in before realizing the airport had an indoor smoking section around the corner. Gross.
At the airport, we bought 3 day metro passes, congratulating ourselves again on our genius savings, and with the thoughtful help of a woman who worked at the metro station, we took a 50 minute metro ride to the Acropolis stop where our hostel was. And before I go any further, I should mention that we were helped twice and to the fullest extent by the Greeks. The first time being the woman at the metro station who helped us find the location of our hostel by giving her the phone number so she could locate the area code, and the second being metro workers that helped us find the way from the metro to our hostel. When we asked the men who worked there if they knew our hostel they said the didn't but then they actually called around the station asking, and then finally called the actual hostel for us without our even asking. And no they didn't hit on us, didn't smile creepily, and didn't ask for anything in return. This is just the first example of kindness from the Greeks. Erin, Sara and I later read in a tour guide book that Greeks are really proud of their country and make it a point to be kind to strangers and giving them a great experience so that people remember them. This was absolutely the case and I don't think I've ever been treated and accepted more graciously. But to continue, after we found our hostel and our room, we came to the realization that we were not alone. In our 4 person mixed room there was a girls luffa and suitcase. Other than our mystery room mate's things, there were 2 bunk beds, a balcony, mini kitchenette with fridge, and bathroom with shower that showers the entire bathroom.
After a quick freshening up, we walked the citrus smelling streets to God's Restaurant (yes that's really its name) which is where I learned my first piece of advice I'll give you: eat feta with everything. We ate baked feta as an appetizer and I ordered spaghetti and muscles with a side of feta for flavor. It was absolutely delicious- a great way to begin the trip. The owner was really sweet too and saw how much we liked the food so he gave us free dessert that had the consistency of fish eggs the size of grains of sand with the flavors of cinnamon, walnuts and brown sugar. It looked so weird but it tasted great. We're still trying to work out what the name of it was because we're not so great with the Greek but it was the perfect light ending to the meal. And as we finished up, a twenty some year old guy walked in speaking Greek and came over to us to introduce himself. He told us he was American and I just blurted out that I thought he was lying because I had just heard him speaking Greek, and then he got more than offended when I refused to believe him until he was like, "I'm from Santa Monica, California." So then I felt really awkward that I called him out, but he let it go and invited us to a party he was having at a local bar- The Flocafe- for spring break. Afterwards, we thanked him for the invite and then debated if we'd go.
So when we finally decided we'd go, we got dressed and went down to the bar attached to the hostel to have a few G & T's (Evan's favorite) which I only drank because Erin convinced me it "tastes just like Christmas" in Paris. No they do not, and after a long discussion that brought us closer together, we made our attempts to get to the Flocafe. Unfortunately, our cab driver never brought us to the Flocafe because he couldn't find it. We walked in to the supposed place, which we knew wasn't the right one, and we confirmed our beliefs when we walked in and no one was there. So, we continued to go to the bathroom, catch a cab, and go straight back to the hostel, which turned out to be about a 3 minute drive from the place we were left at which took 15 minutes to get to. In conclusion, we dubbed that night, "The Party in the Bathroom."
After our party in the bathroom, we gave up and tried to go to sleep, but our room mate had made it back to the room and was snoring louder than anyone I have ever had the inconvenience of listening to. It was violent and extreme and all Erin and I could do was compare it to the winds of Zeus and bang on the walls and clear our throats in the hopes of waking her up. As I was drifting off to sleep finally, I guess I was partly dreaming and someone was telling me to yell, "burglar" so she'd hear the word and think there was an actual burglar and wake up. Nope. I just said burglar out loud in my half sleep before passing out completely.
Day 3- Touring Athens
This was the first day we started listening to Mamma Mia every morning to wake up. And because of that decision even this morning I woke up thinking of Mamma Mia. But anyways, for breakfast, we went to a small cafe where EVERYONE smoked inside. It's a law that your not allowed to anymore, but it's held at the discretion of the owner who obviously isn't going to hinder his business by telling smokers that their not welcome with their cigarettes. The smoking in Athens is worse than France by a million. It's absolutely disgusting. In fact, they can tell your American if you're not smoking all the time. After breakfast, we went to the Acropolis which holds the famous Parthenon and we met the winds of Zeus again because it was soo windy we thought we were going to fall off the mountain.
-The Parthenon-
As we were looking out at this great view of Athens, we found a path that seemed like it led into town so we took it and found ourselves in the middle of the market place. Everything there was hand made by local artists all in an Athens' Artisan Society so you knew their things weren't just crappy trinkets; so, we spent the afternoon browsing the stands and eating ice cream which actually started a bad trend of eating ice cream all the time.
-The View from the Acropolis-
-Sara's and my Ice Cream.-
We also saw The Argura and The Temple of Zeus which is mind blowing to me considering they've been around since BC. I mean they’ve seen wars where the people who’ve fought in them are less than dust now. It’s mind boggling. On a totally different and less dramatic note, Erin read us a FUN FACT from her guide book while walking to dinner. It that said all the stray dogs that we thought we're owned because they look so well fed are taken care of by the towns people who also buy collars and things. And when the Olympics were held in Athens a few years ago, the government took all the dogs off the streets and got them vaccinated and fixed so that they could live healthy in the streets where they like after the Olympics were over. Really cool, right?
That night for dinner, we went to a Greek restaurant where the owner had previously helped us find The Temple of Zeus. He was really nice so we decided on dinner there and it was one of my favorites. We had grapevine wrapped appetizers and I made my own gyro for dinner. It was soo good and I'm now obsessed with the cucumber dipping sauce, Tzatziki, that I will never remember how to say unless Erin says it first. We got Bakalava for dessert and the honey cinnamon mix is amazing (Stacey, I'm not sure if its better than Nick's because I never tried it, but I'm sure it gave it a sweet run for its money). I really want to start putting honey on everything now. And since we didn't have anything else to do, Erin, Sara and I decided to get a carafe of white wine, which was dry and perfect, and then because the owner said he could tell that we were "good girls" he brought us out a dish of oranges all peeled and sliced up which tasted so fresh since all the oranges are in season now, and then a half hour later he brought us apples with honey- now one of my favorite dessert combinations. And after we devoured all of that, he invited us to learn how to Greek dance with the little live traditional Greek band playing inside. So while the rest of the restaurant looked on, Sara, Erin and I skipped around the room attempting to dance, which seems easy BUT ISNT. This is where I learned my second piece of advice: don’t forget to dance in Greece. Our whole eating experience there was one of my favorite memories and we felt really European making our meal last 2 1/2 hours. After dinner we walked back to our hostel with the happy reminder that our room mate had left early in the morning so we had the room all to ourselves :-)
Day 4- Touring Athens Cont’d
On our last day in Athens before Mykanos, we decided we wanted to be more active, so we took the advice of Erin’s tour book and spent the day visiting all the places it suggested. First, we climbed to the top one of one the highest mountains in Athens to see a little whitewashed church named St. George. I packed some sneakers so the journey up wouldn’t be as harsh on my usual flip-flopped feet, but that didn’t help when we reached stairs. Erin and Sara barely had a problem climbing all the way to the top because of their height, but I on the other hand had way more trouble because the stairs were like little mountains for my short legs. However, once we made it to the top, we took lots of pictures and everything was well worth it because the view of Athens made me feel like time didn’t exist at the top of the mountain. It’s one of the most beautiful sites I’ve ever seen in my life. Sorry California, but Greece takes it all.
-On top of St. George’s-
Once we made it safely to the bottom of the mountain, the flip flops came back out and we walked to the National Archeological Museum, but not before we had a 2 euro lunch consisting of the best gyros and ice cream. The museum was amazing with all of its Greek artifacts that date back well before BC. All of the history was actually a bit hard to comprehend being that the United States is a measly 300 years old.
-Greek Pot found in the Kerameikos Cemetery from 460-450 B.C.-
-Close up of Pot: The design of a person having their hands on their heads was a signal that they were mourning.-
After our walk through Greek history, we took a “leisurely” 45 minute tram to the coast of Greece, and as we were riding, we met some really nice boys studying in Jerusalem for the semester, a Greek woman who naturally was more than willing to help us find our stop, and two flight attendants that had the day in Greece before departing again for the United States. I couldn’t believe that anyone would actually WANT to study in Jerusalem with its being so dangerous, but I’m glad I found out I was so obliviously wrong. The guys we met weren’t even all Jewish, actually the one was ridiculously hot, and they just chose it for its history and its experiences apart from Europe. I should have gotten his phone number... Anyway so that was refreshing to hear, and then their was the Greek woman with two children who were trying to tell us the best place to go on the coast, etc, and we didn’t even have to ask her for help. She saw that we were looking at our tour book like losers and made some suggestions. I just love how friendly all the Greeks are, and this is just one more example. And as for the flight attendants, well if I wasn’t afraid of heights and flying so much I might actually do it. They both know how to speak more than one language so they are able to go on international flights and because of this, they have explored more than 32 countries in the past two years. Can you believe it? Even though I am afraid of flying, that makes me want to do it! They said that their pay is bad, and sometimes the hours suck, but its worth it because they’re young and they love to travel. And that’s good enough for me. Hmm....
When we got to the coast, we went out onto the rocks, took pictures, and sat out to watch the romantic sunset over the water. We felt so lucky to have been there to see it. For dinner, we ate a local restaurant and had a Greek salad, grilled feta and a veal appetizer. I’m not a fan of veal at all, but I tried it because all the Greeks love it, and while I wouldn’t pick it over chicken, it still was good. The Greek salad was delicious though; you could taste the crispness of the tomatoes and cucumbers, and mixed in with the feta, it was just the right amount of flavor.
-Coastal Pics-
I also learned another FUN FACT that night from Erin’s book! The water, which was one of those huge European bottles, is always 1.50 euros where ever you go because the government regulates its price so no one gets dehydrated. It was great because we never realized how much water we had to drink there, and we knew we would never be overcharged.
When we got back that night, we noticed that there was a blue backpack on the floor next to the open bunk bed. We looked at it and for anything else around the room that would give way to the sex of the unknown coloc (room mate), but we only had the neutral blue book bag with a Coke Zero in one of the outside pockets. We decided since there was no sign of other luggage, that either it was a health conscious guy or a really manly girl. No one had shown up by the time we went to bed, and I had a horrible time trying to get to sleep because I knew I had to wake up at 5 am for our ferry ride to Mykanos. By 3:30 I had finally fallen asleep only to be awaken at 4 by our room mate who was in fact a guy. I tried making quick convo with him and telling him he could turn on a light if he need, but he said he didn’t need to and just jumped into bed wearing his clothes and tossing his hat. When I fell back asleep, I had a dream that he was from Texas and he was in Greece with his family, but there wasn’t enough space in the rooms so he had to separate. I told him I was sad that we hadn’t met when we were all going out so we could hang out and he said he felt the same way... and then it was 5 am and Drill Sgt. Proper Flower was up and at em. I really wanted to wake the kid up for a second before we left to ask him if he had ever even been to Texas, but I refrained and closed the door behind us.
----Intermission! Second Blog on Mykanos----
