Kevin He

After experiencing the longest flight of my life (spending more than 22 hours in transit) we arrived at the airport in Athens. The airport was rather Spartan and the customs were lacking in comparison to the rigorous examinations we go through as we enter New Zealand. I don’t think the lady who checked my passport even looked at my face. After we all got through we promptly boarded a bus bound for Syntagma Square. The trip took around 2 hours and while we travelled I noticed the rather amazing amount of graffiti that adorned the walls of the city as well as the surprisingly large number of pet shops. We arrived at the square just in time to watch the changing of the guard. The ridiculously exaggerated movements of the guards as they traded places were quite amusing to watch. Next we headed across the road and went under the station where we saw our first ruins, which I think were a set of old sewer systems. After looking around the station we took our luggage and went off in search of our hotel, which we located after walking through several rather dodgy looking streets. We dropped off our luggage at the hotel and set off on an evening tour of Athens, going through Monastiraiki, where we grabbed dinner at the Ice & Grill, and the city cathedral. After that we moved on to Mt Lykevittos. As we hiked up the mountain we were treated to some singing from a church somewhere off in the distance. The views from the mountain were quite stunning and although I was dead tired I still managed to be amazed. We arrived back at the jet lagged and dead tired and I took a quick shower and went straight to bed.

We woke up at 6:30 on the second morning and ate breakfast in a hurry. We then rushed out to meet our bus and began our 3 hour journey to Delphi. During the trip we stopped over at a small supermarket to purchase some food for lunch. As we came into Delphi we were treated to a magnificent view of the town situated in the mountain but due to the speed of the bus I wasn’t able to get a good picture of it. As we arrived at Delhi we promptly trekked up to the outdoor museum, which contained all the ancient ruins. My personal favourite ruin was the stadium where the ancients would hold the Pythian games. From there we returned to the entrance of the indoor museum and had lunch on the steps. While eating we met a rather interesting group of tourists, one of whom who was very amused by the fact that we were from New Zealand. After a lunch of a extremely sweet swiss roll I purchased from the supermarket we headed into the museum where many of the items that were excavated from the site, such as the original Omphalos, the twins of Argos and the Charioteer were kept. After browsing through the museum we went to the Castellan spring where we filled up our bottles and enjoyed its (hopefully virus free) water. After that we boarded the bus once again for the 3 hour drive back into Athens. After arriving at the hotel we were granted a brief 30 minutes respite before we set off again into Athens, this time to visit the Roman Agora(marketplace) , Temple of Olympian Zeus and Hadrians Arch. After our visit to the Agora I joined Lushien and Mr Boyce and Mr Wilson for a expedition to Mc’Donalds on a search for a toilet. While on this expedition I noticed several interesting shops, which unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to browse through. We re-joined the group at the Temple of Olympian Zeus where I delivered a brief summary of the Temple. After our visit to the temple we returned to the hotel and I once again promptly went to sleep.

Our third and final full day in Athens contained a visit to the National Archaeological Museum, the Acropolis and, my personal favourite place, the Acropolis museum. The national Archaeological Museum contained many interesting and brilliant sculptures, including the statue of Zeus/Poseidon, the Jockey and man others. The statue of Zeus/Poseidon is a bronze of the god holding something in mid-air, poised to throw. Personally I believe the statue to be a representation of Zeus. My favourite piece from the museum was definitely the statue of Aphrodite, Pan and Eros. It depicts the satyr god Pan making advances of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, which Eros(also known as cupid) flying around in the background. I find the workmanship of this statue to be particularly amazing. After visiting the museum visit we trekked up the Acropolis and viewed the great temples of old which unfortunately have been mostly destroyed. The view from the Acropolis is quite stunning and the size of the temples quite daunting. Afterwards we paid a visit to the Acropolis museum, which contains the best thing I’ve seen on this trip so far. The two pediments of the Parthenon are simply stunning to look at. The sheer size of the two originals is once again quite daunting but yet inspires a certain feeling of great admiration for the ancients who made them. My favourite of the two is the West pediment, which depicts the founding story of Athens. It shows Poseidon and Athena with their respective gifts for the city surrounded by a crowd of Athenians who were eager to see what the gods would give them.

After our visit to the museum and after we used the free wi-fi there to send messages to our friends and family awe split into groups. One group returned to the hotel for a rest and the other, which I joined, followed Mr Buckingham around the nearby marketplace, slowly making our way back to the hotel as we browsed through the street side stalls. We then returned to the hotel and promptly left again for the shops to do our souvenir shopping. I purchased a small replica of the Winged Nike. The other highlight of this day would have to of been the pair of dogs who joined us for the earlier portion of our day. We found them as we left out hotel and they followed us all through Athens until we reached the National Archaeological Museum where they couldn’t enter. We did however see them as we left the museum but they were fast asleep so they didn’t follow us as we left. The pair of dogs seemed to have a bit of a relationship going on even though they were both male.

Today we toured the ancient cities of Corinth and Mycenae. Both of which were surrounded by nature and were quite picturesque. The Mycenaean citadel had a deep, dark hole, which we looked through but, due to time constraints, we didn’t quite make it to the bottom. We then continued our bus trip to the ferry port at Patras and arrived with plenty of time to spare, boarding the ferry almost an hour before it left. On the ferry we had a riveting conversation with an interesting old man who had many tales to tell. He also seemed very affluent and had a gold watch.

From here we travel to Ancona and then to Rome, where I hear we’re in for several full on days of exploration and walking. I look forward to seeing all the sites of Rome.