Athens is one of the World’s oldest cities. They have so many antiquities here that you can see a bunch of Doric Column bases and stone blocks next to the subway that are just lying about – not even worth figuring out what they’re part of. I guess when you have the Parthenon, what are a few other pieces of ancient stone lying about.
After the Corinth Canal we motored into a beautiful 15 knot breeze (our wind instruments said 15.2 knots from 0 degrees) from right on the nose. GRRRRR. We wanted to make it before dark. Athens is a ridiculously busy harbour with cruise ships, ferries, freighters, military vessels all vying for a fairly small patch of water. The ferries move fast, some are hydrofoils and must do something like 30 knots. Most of these have been replaced with high speed catamarans (these ones do the job they want unlike the BC Fast Cats) and the challenge is that they come out of nowhere and are a problem for us as we cross their path. Going into Athens we had to avoid 3 cruise ships and 4 ferries coming out of Piraeus. Kind of nerve wracking.
We settled into an marina called Faliro. It’s not really a marina it’s more like a superyacht basin. We were sandwiched between a 60 and a 55 foot powerboat, across from us were 80-120 feet yachts – in the outer basin it was more like 90-200 foot boats. The size of yachts here is a bit mind-bending. They’re mostly powerboats that don’t have flybridges – so they look like big speedboats – and they probably consume hundreds of litres of diesel fuel per hour. Unfortunately, we arrived late on Friday night, slept in on Saturday, went to the Parthenon and then realized that nothing is open in Greece on Sunday except places where you can buy food and drink. We had hoped to do some shopping but were not able to …. So we stayed until Monday so we could go to a big mall to look for technology and clothes (guess who wanted what). As it turns out we screwed up the directions to the mall and didn’t end up going. We tend to sleep in fairly late here. Ross often complains about having to start school at 9:30am. Jessie gets up around 8:30 or 9:00 and that gives Marina and I time alone early in the day to enjoy breakfast and a cup of tea or coffee. It’s very luxurious.
Ross is doing a blog entry on our visit to the Parthenon. What I can say is the two major impressions I got from Athens were: the people are friendly and the city is vibrant; and there is so much graffiti and garbage I wonder if anyone cares about the way things look.
Late in the day we left the marina and headed south to the Island of Poros about 20 miles south of Athens. With very little wind we powered most of the way – charging our fridge with cold and keeping our batteries topped up.
My two major impressions from Athens were that the city was vibrant and friendly; and there is there is so much graffiti and garbage I wonder if anyone cares about the way things look.
Ross is doing a blog entry on our visit to the Parthenon. It is a magical place and definitely worth a visit – but next time I want to spend more time in the museums (probably by myself so we’re not pressured to leave, or buy food, or buy drinks, or clothes, or computer games …)
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