A Few More Days in Rome

The day at Pompeii wiped all of us out. We slept in the next morning, lounged and slept some more. Finally, we got ourselves up to go out.

Kim found info online on couple of historic bridges nearby that we could cross so we did an evening walk, walking down to one, crossing it then walking along the river and crossing the other. It was a warm evening but along the river was nice and we got some walking in.

One ancient bridge in Rome

After the day of rest, we got up early and walked to St. Peters. This is a must see in Rome. The basilica was finished in 1626 and has a sculpture created by Michelangelo that is truly amazing. The basilica is huge and everywhere you look there are paintings and frescos. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Saint-Peters-Basilica

View from the entry of St. Peters

St Peters

Michelangelo's Pieta

We did not, however, want to go to the Sistine Chapel. No one was particularly interested and having been once, I was fine with skipping it.

From St. Peter’s it is a very short walk to Castel Sant’Angelo, which was Hadrian’s tomb. This was of interest as we had walked under his arch in Athens and his library. As much as anything, it was nice and cool in the Castel! https://www.britannica.com/topic/Castel-SantAngelo

Fortunately, the day before Pompeii, we’d done the Rick Steves walking tour. Visiting the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain and of course, coffee at the Tazza d’Oro. Iced coffee was perfect for the very warm afternoon. But be aware that iced coffee and frozen coffee are 2 different things, and iced coffee is different from 1 coffee shop to the other.

Zaya throwing a coin into the fountain, hoping that she can return

Dale and Zaya walking down the Spanish Steps

Michelangelo's Moses

Our stay in Rome had to include a visit to Capri before leaving the area. We really didn’t do much, just took the funicular (the cable car) up to Capri Town, which is up

Lunch view

View from the top of the funicular

Lunch

the mountain. We found a place to eat that had lots of gluten free options, then hoped a bus. We’d hoped to go to Anacapri where we could get on a boat to go out to the Blue Grotto. By then we heard that the Blue Grotto was closed, winds were blowing and it was getting to be later afternoon. It just made sense to walk a bit, go back to Capri Town, take the Funicular back down the mountain, catch the ferry to Naples and go back to Rome.

Capri was nice but the sky wasn’t nice so good photos were not really an option.

Time to move on to Florence.

One Whole Day for Pompeii

In college I studied archology for a time, one of several majors. I still love archology and have built this trip around various ancient sites, so it was only natural that we would have to go to Pompeii. I wanted to see Pompeii during my trip here 6 years ago but was so disappointed to have to miss it. We were not going to miss it this time.

We hopped a high-speed train in the morning and about 1 hour later we arrived in Naples train station where we had to get onto a commuter train that would take us to the site of the ruins. This was well and good except that we only had 2 minutes to get down to the next track after buying our tickets. We ran down to the track and the jam-packed train stopped. Zaya and I jumped on but Dale and Kim hesitated only to be left behind.

Zaya and I got off at the next stop and fortunately, Kim brought her phone along (we’d forgotten Dale’s at home). I tried to call Kim several times but the call wouldn’t go thru so finally I sent a text. She sent a text back that they were waiting for the next train. She then sent a text that they had gotten on the next train and were in the 2^nd car from the last.

Zaya and I hopped on the next train but thought we could walk back to the car with Dale and Kim. Nope, couldn’t walk between the cars. At the next stop we ran from the car we were in to the next back and there they were. We lost a little time but had a great story!

Once at Pompeii there was no line at all. We did not take a tour and mistakenly did not get a map from the ticket office but we did have the Rick Steves tour in our book. As it turned out, we didn’t use the tour book much at all.

Some of the items excavated

As we’d read, some sites would be open and others not so the guide books didn’t help much after the entry. We were amazed at the area of Pompeii that has been excavated, a tour guide who wanted us to go with her said that over 17 hectares (42 acres) had been excavated. There was no way we’d go up and down every street.

Items excavated including a child

Mt. Vesuvius thru the arch

Like I said, some things in the guide book were closed but as we wondered up and down streets, we found excavated villas open to walk thru which had beautiful frescos visible and mosaic floors.

Most Pompeiians didn’t have kitchens or baths so ate prepared food. There are so many ruins of fast-food stalls. You can tell the commercial sites because many have the door frames with tracks for sliding doors. The restaurants still have counters, some still have marble counter tops.

Zaya is cooking up a storm for her line of customers

Just one of the rooms we saw with mosaic flooring and frescos on the walls

https://www.britannica.com/place/Pompeii/History-of-excavations

We spent 4 hours walking and by 4 pm when the homes closed, we were hot, tired and hungry.

Getting back to Naples was another adventure. We’d purchased a round trip ticket for the high-speed train to Rome, so knew that we had to get to Naples to get on our 6 pm train. The commuter train did not come and did not come. Finally, it arrived but was way too late to get our train out of Naples.

We were able to change our tickets and were glad to get back to Rome for a very late dinner.

Rome, We Have Arrived

Finally, after hours of messing around with airplane tickets and this and that, we were in Rome. We found our apartment and settled in.

We walked to the Pantheon and back just to stretch our legs.

We had to get an early start to the day as we had a guided tour to the Colosseum. I didn’t realize but the tour included the Forum and Palatine Hill as well. I had thought that we’d take in the Forum and Palatine Hill in the afternoon so this was a pleasant surprise.

https://www.rome-museum.com/palatine-hill-rome.php

The tour was a 3-hour tour, going thru the Forum, Palatine Hill and the Colosseum but it could have lasted a couple of hours longer. We didn’t go thru nearly enough for me. Alas. I may try to go back while we are here.

Arch of Titus

Under the arch 

Temple of Antonino Faustina

We’d wanted to include in our tour, the underground of the Colosseum. Unfortunately, due to Covid, repairs did not start in time, so that portion remains closed. We did get to go out onto the Arena though and could look down into underground. Visible was the lift that was reconstructed to bring animals up to the arena floor.

https://www.frommers.com/blogs/passportable/blog_posts/rome-s-colosseum-gets-its-lion-elevator-back

The Forum and Colosseum are amazing, I’ve been there before so, knew what to expect, but each time is breathtaking. And with this trip, there were so few people.

View of the Arena and underground

The underground from the Arena

The days are getting warmer, low 90’s and super humid. It’s hard to run around seeing sites all day, when all we want to do is sleep or sit and drink frozen coffee in the afternoon. The Italians have a good plan: go out early, nap in the afternoon, then go out in the evening and night. 

As the evening starts the restaurants set up on nearly every street. Around our house the restaurants are open until 12 midnight. You can hear people talking and eating after the sun starts to go down.

Athens, One Last Day

 

This was to be our last full day in Greece. We couldn’t believe that this would be day 8. Where did the time go?

We’d been told that we had to see the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. There is a ceremony on Sunday’s at 11 am that has much pomp and circumstance with special uniforms. The square was only 2 blocks from us so we went there first. What a show. It is difficult to describe and I tried to attach a short video but couldn't.

Part of the Routine

By his Guard House

We wanted to have one last breakfast at Athena Cook. Demetri was there and remembered exactly what we liked to eat and remembered that I could not eat wheat. Wow, we ate there a week ago, our 1^st day in Greece and now our last day.

We had breakfast and took photos of all of us together.

From breakfast we went back to the apartment as it was only across the street. We were hot so sat down to re-coop at bit.

Kim wanted to shop the Flea Market, another Sunday event and Zaya wanted gelato so all 4 of us walked back to our usual place. Zaya got her gelato, I’d wanted some but was way too full.

We went for a bit with Kim into the Flea Market, but I’m not really into shopping and looking at used stuff so we left Kim and went back to the apartment.

The afternoon was filled with packing and repacking, trying to fit everything into our bags, even after we drank 4 bottles of wine during the week. Where did all of our room go?

Ready for our flight in the morning we had some olives, cheese, tomatoes and cucumbers and Limoncello on our own balcony. We were where we started over a week ago.

 

One Last Greek Gelato

Athens Adventures

 

We still hadn’t gone to the Ancient Agora, Zaya needed a wreath head band and a dress and Kim needed a blouse, plus, Kim wanted to see folk dancing and we wanted more Greek Coffee from Nokki and olives.

When I had looked up things to do, so long ago, I didn’t see anything so had given up. Now I found some folk dancing on-line but I couldn’t get thru to the theater. I realized later that I had the wrong country code. Anyway, the dancing was in a very old theater near the Acropolis at 8 pm. We thought we’d do that at the end of the day.

We headed for the Central Market and got our coffee first. We are going to miss that coffee. From coffee we went across the street, bought tomatoes and olives then walked down several streets for Kim and Zaya to shop. Zaya found her golden head wreath
h and dress but Kim didn’t find the shirt she wanted.

We realized that all of us were hungry so we walked to the Souvlaki Strip for Chicken Souvlaki. YUM! One last time. 

From the Strip, we walked on to the Ancient Agora and strolled the streets and walked up the hill to the temple. It actually was very stormy, starting to rain. Fortunately, we had rain jackets so went on our way.

From the Ancient Agora we decided to just walk on to the theater for the folk dance, as it had stopped raining. We found the theater both on a Rick Steves map and on Google. We were fairly confident that we knew where it was. This is a hill outside of the Acropolis with lots of footpaths on it, some going across and some circling. 

We went on the main paved path, up a hill that didn’t look too bad. But then the map showed that we should turn off the main paved path and go up a hill. The path up the hill went straight up, like lots of stairs up. Kim’s knee started hurting so we gave up on that idea.

We then thought that we’d go around on the road to a closer entry to the park then enter. This was great until the foot path into the park narrowed into a small dirt path. We walked and walked, went up stairs in search of a good path. Finally, we came to the place where the map showed that the theater was, but there was nothing that we could find. It was getting dark and Dale and I decided that we had to get off of the hill and into civilization.

Some of the stairs. The path was much more narrow in many places

We found our way back to the road near the Ancient Agora and where there was a rooftop bar. We really needed a glass of wine with a view of the lit Acropolis.

Our view of the Acropolis from our table at the bar

A Day In the Ancient Olympia

 

Dale and I are Olympic fans. We attended a couple of events of the 1986 summer Olympics in LA and several events at the 1988 winter Olympics in Calgary. We went to Paso Robles and saw the torch being carried, and one of the torch bearers let us hold the torch briefly. So, it was only fitting that we wanted to go to Olympia, the place of the original Olympics.

Before leaving for Greece, I tried to figure out how to get to Olympia on our own for as a day trip. This was impossible. I’d read in Rick Steves that he recommended Nikki of Olympia Tour so I contacted her. Yes, the train and then bus would take probably 5 hours each way and yes, neither Dale or I could rent a car due to age. Finally, we just signed up for a private day tour.

The driver met us next to our apartment at 8 am. We drove to Olympia with a stop at the Corinth Canal. The back story, as per our driver, is that before the canal was dug, ships had to go all the way around the area to get from one sea to another. Back in about 600 B.C. the very corrupt king built a sort of road. They would unload the ships on one side, pull the ship on some sort of wheeled thing to the other side, reload the ship and they’d be on their way, for a price of course. Now there is a canal but it is too small for the big ships we have today.

 https://theculturetrip.com/europe/greece/articles/a-brief-history-of-the-corinth-canal/

We went on to Olympia and met Nikki who was to be our tour guide. We were concerned about the weather, as thunderstorms were in the forecast, but Nikki assured us that she’d sacrificed a goat to the God Zeus and was told that there would be no rain on us during our visit. And as predicted there was no rain. There was, however, thunder and lightning but no rain.

Olympia was chosen as a place to hold the Olympics in order to stop the fighting between the city-states. It is surprising how much has been excavated; gymnasiums, one for javelin and high jump and another for boxing. The high jump was a bit different then, the jumper had to hold a rock in each hand then as he jumped, he threw the rocks and this way jumped higher.

Zaya, Dale and Kim all ran a race on the original track, starting at the original start line. Zaya and Dale ran to the end of the track and Zaya won fair and square. Kim gave it her best shot. Zaya was crowned as the winner with a laurel head wreath as the athletes were so long ago. She didn’t however, have a sculpture made of me as her coach. Perhaps she is not so generous.

I did, for the record, walk the track from one end to the other. This was how the athletes’ raced, down to the end then back. I thought that maybe I was in a walking race against myself.

Zaya having been crowned the winner. She is standing in front of the site where the Olympic flame is lit.

I could have stayed lots longer at the site but we had to hurry. We were having a private, home-made lunch, everything Greek, and the time was set for us to be there between 2:30-3 pm. We did go quickly thru the museum and saw a couple of important sculptures.

We went on to lunch at a fabulous house. The downstairs consisted of a living room with glass on 3 sides. One side opened up into a covered patio with the home above. There was an outdoor kitchen where the woman did the cooking for the lunch. She made gluten free versions of the dishes which was nice, except for the Orzo and Baklava. Alas. But I got some of the recipes which I will try when we get home.

The driver took us back home on the road to the North then headed East to Athens, so that we saw a different type of landscape.

All Things Acropolis Day

Thunderstorms have been forecast for the rest of the week but the storms were forecast in the afternoon. We’d read, also, that we should visit the Acropolis early in the day; 1 to avoid the masses of tourists and 2 to avoid the heat of the afternoon. We also figured that we’d avoid any afternoon storms. The plan was to get to the Acropolis about 8:30 am, talk our time there and then go to the museum. We thought we’d get lunch at the café in the museum then see visit the museum, enjoying cooler air and avoiding any rain.

We got up by 7, out the door by 8 and at the entry gate by 8:15. As there was no line we got right in and started our visit.

Walking up the path to the Acropolis is a not as steep as some hikes but still steep. However, there are many ruins and sites to divert one’s attention so that it makes the walk up seem easier. There were temples, buildings for people to gather and a stadium all on 2 sides. Another side has houses built into the hill that we saw on a walk a few days ago.

We made lots of stops but then finally got to the top after a series of marble steps close to the top. When one comes up the steps then you walk around the wall and there it is, the amazing entry. The entry is made larger as it is on the hill top so you are looking up. We were so lucky as not many people were there at all.

The entry

The Parthenon is a massive structure that is undergoing restoration. But even with the scaffolding along the side it is impressive. Just like the ancient time when it was built, one cannot go in, but with walls down inside we can see inside.

https://ancient-greece.org/architecture/parthenon.html

A 2nd favorite is the Erechtheion, a smaller, 2-story temple. There are wonderful sculptures on one side and because it is built partially on the side of the hill, the top floor is open to see into and the bottom floor is partially visible thru the door and window.

After wondering around for about 3 hours it started to get really hot on top and we noted that more people were entering. It was time to go down to the lower elevations where there are trees and not so many people.

We made our way over to the Acropolis Museum where we knew it would be nice inside. Besides, the sky was getting darker and with thunderstorms in the forecast we thought we’d be safer in there.

First things first, we were hungry and had read about the Museum Café, that would be our first stop. After buying tickets we headed for the Café.

Due to Covid, there is no indoor seating at the Café, but the outdoor seating has a really nice view of the Acropolis. It was warm but we found a table under the awning so it wasn’t so bad. With a nice cup of iced coffee, we were feeling fine and some food, we felt much better.

The museum is quite extensive with videos on the 3^rd floor. There are several different videos and 1. It gives one a break from walking and standing and 2. They explain various things.

Parts of original sculptures along the top of the Parthenon

The museum and Acropolis made for a long day and we slept well that night.

Days 2 & 3 in Athens

 

Tuesday and Wednesday: I’m combining these 2 days because we didn’t do much to write about.

Tuesday

The big plan for today was to go early to the Roman Forum and Tower of the Winds. Of course, we didn’t get up early so ended up getting to the Forum by noon. My advice is to go earlier if possible as it gets quite hot in the sun. But then if you are like us, it is impossible to go early because we stay up so late at night.

The Forum is a place where the Greeks would gather to talk and shop. We were free to walk about much of the area. http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/3/eh351.jsp?obj_id=2402 is a site with good descriptions.

At the back side of the Forum is a tower, Tower of Winds. This was an early version of a clock and weather station. http://odysseus.culture.gr/h/2/gh251.jsp?obj_id=1839

Tower of Winds

Ceiling of the Tower of Winds

Floor in the Tower of Winds

From the Forum we decided to go up the road back to the coffee shop next to the Central Market. Unfortunately, we didn’t realize that the coffee shop closes at 3:30 so we were out of luck. But this gave us a chance to try a different coffee shop closer to home, and that was acceptable.

While walking back home we went by the Cathedral and thought, maybe we should get some dinner. We went to a restaurant that we had seen before and found that they only had fish for main entries. They did have other side dishes on the menu but we like fish so thought we’d try it. I had cod in a lemon/fish sauce and dale had grilled sardines. This was truly the best fish ever.

Wednesday

Our friend from home, Kim Bergman, was on her way to join us, she was supposed to be here on Tues but then flights went to hell and she couldn’t get here until Wed.

I looked at the transportation options for me to fetch her and found that there was an express airport bus that left had a stop about 1 block away and was only 5.5 euros. A taxi would be 40 euros. That made the decision easy. Dale and Zaya walked up to the stop with me and off I went.

I got to the airport, found that Kim’s plane was late, went to the Departures and got some Greek Coffee then went back down to Arrivals to wait for her. I was glad to see her walk into the waiting area.

After Kim had time to clean up a bit, she was willing to see a little bit of Athens and walk around. We wanted to go to Hadrian’s Library and pick up our combo tickets. The combo tickets are only good for 5 consecutive days but would get us into various sites including the Acropolis. While we were there we went thru the library.

We thought that we’d take Kim to the fish restaurant since it was so good the day before. We were told yesterday that the restaurant would be jam packed so we should reserve a table but we didn't. In reality the restaurant was open with only a few tables filled. Then we were told that they were out of the fish we’d had the day before. Unfortunately, they were out of all of the fish we’d had the night before and only had the fish of the day, which we knew was super expensive. We chose a couple of filets and a filet of the fish of the day. The various filets were good but we had not wanted to spend so much money. I don’t think we will go back there again.

Red Mullet

As rain had been forecast for this afternoon, we thought we’d head home. But before we could get home a thunderstorm hit. Since it was nice out when we left, a little cloudy but nothing more, we did not bring raincoats or umbrellas. The rain dumped on us, we could see the lightening and the thunder was explosive. I was concerned that the pavers would get slick. We walked as fast as we could but without slipping. As we got to our street the water was up to the height of the curb.

Dale had stopped at the store and by the time he got out of the store, the water was over the curb, sweeping signs along as it ran down the street. Dale stood with others, under an awning and waited for the storm to pass. It did not take long for the water to subside and he was able to walk back to the apartment.

Day 2 in Athens

 

We did wake up earlier and I sent Dale and Zaya down to the bakeries to get something good. There is a small bakery right across the street and one about 20 feet away from our apartment building. It takes longer to walk down the stairs then it does to walk next door or across the street. Unfortunately, there is nothing gluten free for me, but fortunately, they don’t have anything gluten free since it doesn’t look good on my butt. Zaya did buy a pastry that was filled with chocolate ganache. I took a taste of the ganache and it was chocolate heaven!

We started earlier today for a walk to the Central Market. This is a place where the locals shop. There is one huge building that is just meat and fish, laid out in a cross shape. I didn’t shoot photos in the meat side, except for 1. I will have to shoot a couple more when we return. But the smell of meat was overwhelming. The same can be said for the fish section. There was every kind of fish for sale. Most I wouldn’t touch, but then I don’t touch anything but stuff already filleted from the store. Even as a young girl I would not touch a whole fish, even when offered money from my dad.

The fish portion of the Central Market

Possibly a sheep head for dinner?

We did then look at the Rick Steves map and realized that the rest of the market was across the street. We bought 3 different kinds of olives, including the seller’s favorite. These we will have for dinner tonight and tomorrow.

I’d forgotten that the better Rick Steves write up was in the larger book so we wondered around. Then we saw a little coffee shop, Mokka, with lots of people sitting outside mostly speaking Greek. We stopped, found a table and saw that the people at the little table beside us were drinking what appeared to be Turkish Coffee. We told the waiter that we wanted what they were having, which turned out to be Greek Coffee. When I went inside to pay, I noticed that the little pots were in what looked to be sand. After we got back home, I read that they put cold water, ground coffee and sugar in the pot then heat the coffee in hot sand, that is the traditional way. And, as it turns out, this is the coffee spot recommended in the guide book. This was the best coffee!

Greek Coffee at Mokka

We walked around, then went down into the remains of Hadrian’s Library. I shot photos and we looked around. The site was relatively empty of people so we could take our time and shoot photos without problems.

The Library was along the rear wall

On our way back to the apartment we were tired so stopped for a Greek coffee at another square. It wasn’t good at all. We have made it our goal to find the best Greek coffee while we are here.

After a short nap we decided that we really needed to view the Acropolis at night. Last year lights were installed in different areas so that from different areas of the city one can see it lit up on top of the hill. A good view is a short walk from where we are staying, so we took a stroll down to Hadrian’s Library to view it. On the way down we stopped for a pre-dinner gelato and it was perfect on a warm summer night.

Hadrian's Library to the left and the Acropolis in the background

The Acropolis is so amazingly beautiful in the night, so moving to see something that is so ancient like this.