We took a lovely road trip yesterday, but before I share some photos from that and catch up with my 52/50, I wanted to finish up the photos from our short stay in Athens.
After lunch on the first day, we visited the Central Market. In Istanbul, I was surprised to see sheep’s heads, tripe and intestines displayed in all the butcher shop windows. Here the whole animal was hanging from the hooks.
Athens, like Istanbul, has created a pedestrian mall–here part of Ermon Street.
We watched as a travel video was being filmed here. The poor narrator repeated his steps at least six times as we watched. I had no idea how tedious making one of these travel videos must be!
Graffiti is everywhere in Athens. Tracy was quite put off by it, but I enjoyed photographing it.
We finished our day at a lovely rooftop restaurant, Psarras, recommended by friends.
As the sky got dark, a full moon appeared–a very romantic end to the day.
The next morning we left by ferry for Santorini from Piraeus.
After our time on Santorini (blog posts to come) we spent our last afternoon in Athens visiting the New Acropolis Museum. It’s a beautiful building, and we were fascinated to see it’s been built over one of the excavation sites.
Photographs were not allowed in the main exhibition, but were allowed in other parts of the museum. So much of the beautiful art was plundered by conquerors over the years, but what has survived is fascinating.
After supper, we walked down to Hadrian’s Gate (132 A.D.), or the Arch of Hadrian. The arch originally spanned an ancient road, and inscriptions were found honoring both Hadrian and Theseus as founders of Athens. I like that you can see the Acropolis through the gate in this photo.
Given our short time in Athens, we managed to get a glimpse of some of the ancient history I enjoyed reading about through myths and in social studies classes. The monuments here make some of the ancient sites in Istanbul seem like youngsters.
Graffiti has its place but it can ruin the atmosphere in some circumstances … though, it is fabulous to photograph!
The museum built around the ruins is fantastic – must visit one day!
Hello Karen. I have had a lovely time this morning catching up with you. Your cards, as always are simply fabulous! You have given such a wonderful flavour of Athens (and Istanbul) with your gorgeous photos’ and talking of photo’s I love your new picture on your blog! You look so beautiful, and younger, your hair is softer …. so glad to catch up. Oh! and I just loved the picture of the Caleb and Skylar holding hands.
Love the graffiti pictures! I think it really has to do with the context. We chatted earlier about the graffiti in Melbourne – the city embraced it and it’s beautiful. I’m curious to see if I’ll think the same thing when I see Athens!
What fantastic photos Karen. I like the colour that that graffiti can bring. I love seeing your holiday through your photographers eye. You capture such lovely details.
More great photos that I thoroughly enjoyed browsing! That graffiti is crazy, isn’t it? It’s really cool that they’ve built the museum over the excavation site.
I love the Athens pictures, but I’m especially taken with that moon. How romantic, indeed!
I love markets!!!
The rooftop restaurant and sunrise and both gorgeous.
Rinda
I really enjoyed that glimpse of the old cut away into the new like that – what a great way to honour both. Glad you had a romantic evening despite the sprays paint!
Comments are closed.