Monday 1st. November

After getting mobilized in the morning we went down to reception to arrange some further trips for the week. MAC thought to ask if we could change our room as the construction work had been rather disturbing during the morning. They agreed and in a very few minutes we had decanted all our belongings to a new room which was much further away from the site of the construction work.

We then made a booking for the trip to Delphi and Meteora on Wednesday and Thursday. Having completed that we walked down the street and sat an outdoor café to have coffee, freshly squeezed orange juice and a piece of Greek spinach pie.

We walked further into town and to the Parliament building and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier where the ceremonial guards were on parade, together with some rather lazy dogs. We watched them guarding the monument for a while and then crossed over the street to look at the lobby of the Hotel Grande Bretagne which is very Grande. The lobby was full of people who had run or attended the Athens Marathons, held the day before, checking out. The Marathon was billed as the 2,500^th anniversary of the first marathon when a messenger ran from the site of the Battle of Marathon to Athens to relay the news of the Athenian victory over the Persians. Legend has it he dropped dead after relaying the news. After the hotel we re-crossed the street to see them change the Guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

We then walked onwards down the hill across the square, saw the portion of Hadrian’s aqueduct on display and walked towards the Acropolis. We climbed up towards the ticket booth where were met by a guide who offered hers services to us which we decided to accept. Her name was Miranda-Maria Skiniti. She was a very knowledgeable guide and proved to be well worth recruiting as she gave us a very informative tour of the site pointing out not only the archeological but also the architectural parts, the history and the roles played by the gods and mortals who made ancient Greece such a seminal place in the development of man. These are things  which we would otherwise have missed. We passed the small exquisite Temple of Nike or Winged Victory and then on to the main building and saw the amazing but almost hidden features which make the whole building so stunning. She explained the significance of the square root of the number 5 in the way in which the pillars where placed and the internal relationships of the building were aligned. We also saw the other adjacent sites from above, such as the Pnyx, (known as the first democratic parliament), the Agora, the theater of Dionysus, the Medical School, as well as Hadrian’s Temple and Arch.

Miranda left us with the invitation to go to Sunion in her car to see the sun set which we accepted.

Before leaving we took some photos of Porridge and Homer at the Acropolis but we were then stopped by a park ranger who said such photos were not allowed and made me delete mine from the camera. She was unimpressed with Homer’s Greek name. MAC had, fortunately sneaked a photo before me and was able to retain it so the visit of the intrepid bears to the Acropolis has been recorded for all time.

On coming down from the Acropolis, we met Miranda again and got into her car. We stopped on the way for a delicious pastry for lunch and then drove to Sunion through the southern suburbs of Athens, past many mansions of the rich shipping community here. We saw the old Athens airport which has been bought by the Crown Prince of Qatar which will develop it into a 7-Star hotel, shopping mall and other diversions. We also stopped at some hot springs which had been formed by a volcanic eruption and which had left a small lake filled with warm sulfurous water used by people for its restorative powers.

Onward to Sunion where we arrived just as the sun was setting on this dramatic headland at the southern tip of Greece. The site is dominated by the Temple to Poseidon, god of the sea and also of volcanoes. This is a magical place, so much so that Lord Byron engraved his name into one of the pillars showing that even poets and lords can be vandals!! We shared a beautiful sunset with a small crowd of people including some of the marathon runners whom Miranda had shown around Athens in the previous days.

Then we drove back to Athens and bid farewell to Miranda who had given us an unforgettable day.

We had a nice dinner in a local tavern and retired to our newly quiet room for some well-earned rest.