Athens, Greece

Upon return to Athens after the trip to northern Greece, I spent two days wandering central Athens. I did all the typical tourist things, so I'm subjecting you to pictures of things you've probably seen before.

First, I had to take a picture of this as I think they missed something in translation!

Here's the changing of the guard ceremony in front of what used to be the King of Greece's palace, but is not the home of the Greek Parliament. The tufts on the tips of their shoes were to hold knives to surprise their enemies in battle.

Parthenon! To think that they built this in 9 years in the 5th century BC. It was the Venetians in the 1600's that bombed the building to it's current state.

A piece of the pediment on the eastern side (entrance because it faces the sun). I believe we're seeing Dionysius, the god of wine and celebration.

The Parthenon was built as a temple to Athena, the goddess of wisdom. The Greeks also built a second temple on the top of the Acropolis, the Temple of Poseidon, the god of the sea.

The womens entrance to The Temple of Poseidon. Note that the dimensions make it a Golden rectangle.

Remember that the Parthenon and Temple of Poseidon were the two major buildings built on the Acropolis (the rock), but that there was an entire city and major buildings down at the base of the Acropolis. Here are some of the buildings that are at "sea level".

A recreated model of what historians think the area around the Acropolis looked like.

Yanni, Live at the Acropolis (and yes, I still love Yanni), here it is. There are two major theaters on the South side of the Acropolis, this one has been restored and is used regularly by the city of Athens, just like in ancient times.

This is the 1950's reconstruction of the stoa (public gathering place) of the area called the agora (market). I wrote my last college paper in Art History about this building.

The area around the Acropolis is still a working archeological site. The new Acropolis museum is built on top of a site. Here you can see the work going on beneath the see through floor.

The top floor of the new museum is an architecturally BRILLIANT celebration of the Parthenon. They have recreated the friezes, pediments and placed them all in the correct orientation. It's amazing how the archeologists have been able to identify random small bits and place them in the right place. Many of the friezes are being restored but any panel that is in blinding white concrete is known to be outside the country of Greece. So, it's time for the BRITISH MUSEUM TO RETURN these items to their rightful owner.

In my continued exploration of Athens, but what did surprise me was the quality and cleanliness of the Athens Metro System. Many of you know that I LOVE public transportation systems and so I was proud of myself for taking a taxi only twice during my entire 8 days in the Greece. I always make an effort to ride either a bus line or a subway line to its terminus. Near the end of the Green Line's northern end, here's what I found.

The complex from the 2004 Summer Olympic Games. Here's the velodrome.

This huge facility was sitting empty. I asked the guard if it's ever used. He says that it's a training facility for athletes and that there are occasional events, but it sits there as a monument to a time gone by 5 years ago. It was quite sad to think that all the money was spent to have these facilities just sit there for so many years.

This is the warm-up pool for swimmers who competed in the 2004 games. I asked around and found out that had I not been there in August (summer break for the entire continent of Europe) I could have come back and swam. Bummer.