Ancient Athens

The alarms went off early this morning for our day in Athens. It was breakfast in the room before meeting in the atrium at 7:15. Once we gathered, we were off the ship and into another minibus to take us to Athens and the Acropolis. Traffic was heavy so it took around an hour.

We met our guide Andronikos at the base of the Acropolis for our tour of the Parthenon and surrounding ruins. The hike is steep and no strollers are allowed so we checked it at the gate station and then started hiking. The Acropolis is the highest point in Athens and we could see our ship way in the distance at the port. It’s also extremely busy so even though we were early, there were lots of other tour groups too. The staff keep everyone moving while going up the steps to what was the main gate so it’s not easy to take pictures.

Once at the Parthenon, we were able to find some shade and learn more about the construction, gods, and more. Every city had an Acropolis but the one in Athens lasted because of the construction and the iron in the marble. All in all the views were breathtaking, the site is really neat, and we had a great guide.

We made our way back down and found a place to rest at the bottom. We said good bye to Andronikos and had about a half hour before our next tour guide picked us up. Peter and Dad picked up some sandwiches and smoothies from a nearby deli and Keely and Mom found some sparkling juice beverages at a coffee shop.

Our next tour guide, Nikki, met us at our resting spot as we were wrapping up our snack. This tour was taking us on a walking tour of many ancient ruins of Athens. Our first stop was climbing a hill to get an amazing view of the Acropolis. The kids played a quick game with Nikki while we took in the views. Back down at the base of the hill, the kids learned to write their names using the Greek alphabet. This alphabet is phonetic and has a few less letters than ours so it was harder than we thought!

We then had a nice long walk to our next stop along a beautiful, wide pedestrian street along the base of the Acropolis park. The buildings were well maintained and there were many flowering bushes along the path. The next stop was at a trophy monument that used to display the trophies for the best plays. Here the kids talked a lot about the gods of Greek mythology. Peter’s kids knew so much about this and everyone seemed to really enjoy it while Whitaker played in the dirt and gravel and Nora and MacKenzie napped in their stroller.

We moved on to Zeus’s temple which was one of the largest in Athens. Most of the pillars are gone now with one falling in the last few decades. The kids activity here was to choose a god and draw the gift they provided and the town named after them like Athens is named after the god Athena.

We moved on to one of the coolest stops, the Olympic stadium. The Ancient Greek stadium is several hours away from Athens but this is the stadium that hosted the first modern Olympics in the late 1800s. The entire stadium seating is made of marble and is mostly used for concerts now but did host some events during the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens. The kids did races and stood on the podiums. It was a really fun spot.

At this point the crew was running out of energy and the sun and heat and congestion of a big city was taking its toll. We opted for a brief walk through the National Gardens on our way to the bus. They were beautiful and shaded which was a good end to the tour of Athens. We parted ways with Nikki who was wonderful and boarded our minibus back to the ship.

Tonight was Pirates night but first everyone wanted to hop in the pool. As we walked up to our room, we noticed the line for Pirate Mickey was super short so we grabbed a quick photo and then changed into swim gear to head to the pool for a quick cooldown before dinner.

Back in the room we changed into our pirate outfits and headed downstairs to see what characters we could find. We took some photos as a family and then it was off to dinner back in Animators Palate for the pirate night menu. We wanted to get back to see Captain Hook and Mr Smee so Mom and I ordered Mickey Bars to go and got in line. The rest of the crew joined us as they finished up their desserts. We also saw Goofy, Donald and Minnie in their pirate gear. While the adults waited in line, the big kids had a great time playing shuffle board and watching the ship leave the dock in Athens.

The Mickey’s pirate show didn’t start until 10:10 pm for some crazy reason but the kids really wanted to see it so we were back up to Deck 11 to wait for the show. By this time, everyone else had gone to bed except Mom & Dad who joined us for the show. It was very fun and by the end, the kids were too tired for the pirate dance club after party so it was finally time for bed and lights were out by 11 or so.

Athens was hot, dusty, and crowded but such a neat place that it was well worth it. Tomorrow we go to Mykonos. We’ll be leaving our ship to hop on another and sail around the island of Mykonos which should be amazing if everyone can overcome their lack of sleep! Fingers crossed!