Athens hates calves...

Hello all!
The cobbled and winding streets have sure done a number to our calves, so we are a bit stiff - but it has been great.

Its 10:40pm here on Monday. Yesterday we mostly walked around and hit all the big sites. We started the morning off, after a good 12 hours or so of sleep, by wandering to the Acropolis which as tradition has it apparently lead ultimately to us wandering into a dead end in the Plaka district and setting off an alarm. Finally we found our way to the main pedestrian walkway and saw the Theater of Herodes Atticus on the way up to the Acropolis. Here in Greece, the security people for the major sites tend to look like regularly dressed pedestrians and they enforce the regulations by way of greetings (particularly "Hello!") rather than things like "Don't touch" or "Off"...etc. Its humorous and a bit confusing when someone in the crowd just starts yelling HELLO into the crowd hoping to get their point across! The Acropolis was amazing and the views were terrific! After we also toured the Ancient Agora and walked over to Kerameikos where it looked like there had been some sort of hobo war...there were clothes and belongings everywhere!

We walked back through the main shop area and glanced at the goods on our way back to the hotel to drop off our things before dinner. We ended up eating at a restaurant called Scholario that serves Mezedes (much like Tapas). It was very good and we tasted our first ouzo in Greece. It was very reasonable and pleasant!

That night we watched some weird Greek TV and saw what American programs were broadcasting (the selection is very interesting)...Michaela, we watched a little Jaime Oliver for you! Unfortunately we ended up waking up at about 3am and not being able to get back to sleep until a few hours later, which at that point we only had a little more time before we had planned to get up for today's events.

Today was amazing! We started the day off by taking the Metro to Likavittos, which is the highest point around here. The view was spectacular! We could see the Acropolis and so much more! We then took the metro back after enjoying the view and resting from the long trek up the hill. We bought some water and headed back out to go to the Archeological Museum, which was nice - but some of it was closed including the shop which was a little disappointing. When we returned we enjoyed a gyro in Ministiraki and then went back to the hotel for a quick nap and to regroup for the evening. We had a pleasant dinner and enjoyed an after dinner drink in one of the oldest bars in Athens.

There are more details, but I've run out of time and we must go to bed for now in order to get up for tomorrow's adventures.

Goodnight for now.