athens

it was great to get to see so many people in athens. we got into athens in the evening and after we got to jessie briol's apartment we had a great dinner with jessie, jessie's mom, and her friend. I like going out to eat in athens because they often give you something at the end of the meal on the house. that night we got a tray of apple slices with honey on them, they were really good

the next day we decided to climb the highest hill in athens. the view of athens was great! athens is such a big city, they pack about 3 million people into not that large of an area without using skyscapers or other tall buildings. we chilled on the top for a while, took some pictures. i found out how much i liked the greece flag (its so awesome fyi). after the hill climb we walked around the city for a while, ended up exploring this cool little "city" below the acropolis.

next day abby got in from israel and ryan farkus came back from his travels (he is studying in greece on the same program jessie is doing). we decided to head to the acropolis, see the parthenon and all of that good stuff. it was great, i'm glad i was able to see that. so much history in greece, its crazy to think about how old so many things in athens are. that night ryan farkus cooked rabbit stew for us and something else that i can't remember, it was very very tasty. we also got the see the changing of the guards in front of parliament. it is a pretty strange ritual, def worth seeing.

on thursday, abby, lynsey and i decided to try and take a day trip to one of the islands close to athens. the plan was to take the metro to the port and from there a ferry to the island. unfortunately the metro workers were on strike and we forced to figure out the bus system to get to the port, we ended up on a super crowded bus (since everyone was taking the bus instead of the metro) and rode it for about an hour before talking to someone and realizing we had gone too far. we got off and walked a little ways backwards and eventually found the port but by the time we got to where the ferry to the island left we were one minute late and the next ferry didn't leave for a while, we decided that it wasn't worth it, cause we wanted to be back in time to have dinner with jessie and ryan, and we got back on the bus and headed back towards the center of the city. that night we went to a halloween party at jessie and ryan's school, they gave us really good food (some souvlaki, french fries, pita, etc) after some dancing at the halloween party we headed out and found some really good gelato.

the next day lynsey and i departed for copenhagen (luckily we did have sterling tickets back)



pictures at:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2025748&l=2011a&id=19103095