Most of our days in Athens were dry but now and then it rained but we were mostly quite lucky.

Our first few days we walked most of the tourist areas and saw most of the sites.

The good thing here is that I get a free ticket for all the sites (you just have to buy 1 which includes all the Acropolis) whereas in Egypt I had to pay full price! Mainly because they didn’t believe i was 12.

Just a few minutes walk from our apartment is the Panathenaic stadium. We didn’t go inside as you had to pay and it wasn’t like there was a million things to see once you get inside.

The Panathenaic Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium used for several events and athletics in Athens. The stadium hosted the first modern Olympic Games in 1896. The Panathenaic is the only stadium built entirely from marble and is one of the oldest in the world.

The first temple we visited was the Temple Of Olympian Zeus. This temple was made of local limestone in the Corinthian style.

Next we walked up the hill all the way up until we reached the Propylaea which was the entrance of the Acropolis.

We walked through this temple and straight ahead was the famous Parthenon. It was dedicated to the goddess Athena, with 46 outer columns and it was huge. Unfortunately they have covered all the back with scaffolding so that spoiled it quite a bit.

I wouldn’t say it was my favourite building in the world but I think we’ve been too spoiled with Egyptian architecture. If we hadn’t just seen all the Egyptian temples it would have seemed a lot more spectacular but you can’t deny how beautiful the setting is.

You have a full 360 degree view over the city Athens. You could see the sea towards the right, the temple of Zeus and all the other sites around Athens.

The other temples near the Parthenon were the Erechtheion, Athena Nike (which was on the other side of the Erechtheion)

and a few more that were totally ruined which were all built in the Pericles period (495-429 BC). Most of it was roped off (unlike Egypt you couldn’t sneak in) but you could still walk a fair amount.

The Parthenon and a few other temples were damaged during a 1687 seige by the Venetians (from Italy) in the Morean War (1684-1699) and the Parthenon was used for Gun powder storage and was also hit by a cannonball so you wouldn’t really expect it to be in a very good condition.

After half an hour or something we walked back down the Acropolis to the Areopagus hill ( a.k.a Ares Rock). This place is said to be the place were St Paul converted people to Christianity.

After in the Classical times it functioned as the High court of Appeal for criminals and Civil cases. It still continued to rule in Roman times and it was from here that the Apostle Paul is said to have delivered the famous speech

“Now what you worship as something unknown I am going to proclaim to you, the god who made the world and everything in it is the lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands”.

The view from here up to the Parthenon was spectacular, it looked like something off a fairy tale.

Down from here we walked into town and settled down in a fairly expensive restaurant and I enjoyed a huge cheese pie, after not having one in Egypt it was so tasty.

If we just wanted to go for a walk we went into the National Gardens which was just opposite the Olympic Stadium. They are massive, beautiful gardens with lots of different trees to see and a park for Jed.

We went shopping for a new suitcase for TUT (The Ultimate Traveller) as the one he bought in Aswan broke. So he bought an expensive one and we pulled it home through the park when it was starting to go dark. It started raining so we got soaked in the process. We also got los,t well we didn’t actually get lost it’s just that all the gates were locked. I was already thinking about sleeping in the park for the night and keeping Jed in the suitcase (yes, that’s how useful I am). In the end mum finally found the way out as we had given up.

The town center is only on the other side of the park and we saw the Changing of the Guard outside the parliament building.

It is really fun and I recommend you to see it.