Greece... My Way

October 9, - October 16, - Athens, Greece

Athens in October, Post-Olympics. It's now a typical European city - which it was not a decade ago - that's good and bad... but mostly good. And these little wooden puppets still make a perfect gift.

The airport is the first place you notice the changes. It's totally modern and welcoming. Here it's about 7:00am and I'm kind of hung over from excessive alchohol consumption. AirFrance oblige.

The first night we had dinner on the poarch at Maria's house... Retsina is definitely my beverage of choice in Greece.

Manolis, Steph and Nasos entertain us with a medley of Greek, French and American songs...

Steph and Nasos always make good music together...ummm, almost always.

Aleko joins in on harmonica.

From our room at the Hilton we had a great view of the Acropolis.

Here's how it looked at night...illuminated.

And this is our view of the Hilton swimming pool. It's the biggest pool in Athens.

...and it too was nicely lit at night. Perfect for an illicit evening swim.

We spent lot's of time wandering about in the city. We visited the byzantine churches...and explored ancient ruins.

This little architectural item was impressive...even from a distance.

...and we shopped for souvenirs...the blue eyes were always watching.

No. 94: Nick and I reflected in an antique mirror...next we went to see the open food markets...

Greeks eat lot's of things from the sea, so the fish market in central Athens is huge. Here are some Octopi...don't they look delish...

...or not. These guys are called langoustine. They truely are wonderful but are rarely found in the US. They're like a cross between a large prawn and a small lobster.

These little home made pretzel things are found in most Greek bakeries. They're really good with a glass of Retsina.

Spoon sweets sold here...They're various types of fruit and nuts poached and bathing in syrup. They are served in a special dish with spoons hanging around it. Each person is given a small flat dish and a glass of cold water, the the bowl is passed around and each person takes spoonful of sweets onto his plate and a spoon to eat them with. I love this tradition

and these are little pastery balls drenched in honey...I took this photo in a very expensive bakery in kolonaki and the girl told me it photos were not allowed. I found that funny.

Three flags; Athens - Greece - Europe. I took this near Steph's house, but you see them everywhere. Symbolic of modern Greece.

This little kitten lives across the street from Steph and Nassos. We met her every day on our way in...isn't she just so cute!

This is the living room at Steph and Nasos' house. Nasos made all the furniture himself. Steph painted the painting on the floor next to the fireplace.

Steph made this wonderful little snack for us...she just whipped it up in...like...five minutes!

Here she is with Dad, Nick...she also painted the painting behind them.

Here's Steph and Nick again in the lobby of the Hilton...They're joined here by Emma, Steph's sister. We call her Manou, short for Emmanuelle, her real name. What ever the name the girl is beautiful...so is Steph.

Chris (Christos) and George(Yorgos). They do hair at the Hilton's salon. They did such a good job with Steph's style that I asked them to do mine.

The results were so good I couldn't resist taking this photo in the elevator!

That night we went to a typical Greek taverna for Greek lamb chops all lemony and rubbed with oregano and grilled...I just love them...and they're a specialty of this place...Nasos and Nick had a duel with these lighters they brought from an itinerant vendor.

On the way out Steph and Nick felt like having a final drink...when they saw this sign.

The following night we went to a fish restaurant. These little red fish are the best. They're generally fried whole and served with the olive oil-lemon sauce you see here...

Emma decorated her fish with a big wedge of lemon...no one laughed...in fact, she was scolded by her Dad for playing with her food.

Lovely Maria, Emma and Steph's mom, often joined us for dinner. I took this photo of Steph,Maria,Nick and Emma at a Greek-French fusion restaurant where they had very innovative deserts.

Em and Nick at the end of a lovely evening. The next day I walked all over Athens and took in some more sights that make this city distinctive.

The changing of the guard at the palace is somthing to see...

The uniformes are very detailed and quite whimsical...and the soldiers are very serious.

There are some beautiful little courtyards in Athens...this one was quite near the center of town, and had a beautiful iron gate surrounding it.

These wonderful icons were cloistered behind a metal barriers. They're beautiful, amd I think they must be very valuable.

As anywhere, there's lots of interesting graphiti in Athens...look at this little guy...he's the mascot of a big electronics shop and this was drawn on the wall in the unisex restroom.

This little train looks like it was printed onto the building wall...in fact it was near the train station. That sort of makes sense.

I fell in love with old neon sigh (yeah, call me wierd) I just think it got so much character...I would love to have seen it at night though it's probably no longer illuminated.

Babyloon...believe it or not...is a restaurant. Interesting name, isn't it?

In the middle of the city on the random wall of a random building was this mirror that despite it's cracks and wear is still used by passers by (including me) to check their appearance.