Second Day in Athens

We had a bus tour of the modern city on our second day. We saw the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in front of the Parliament building. The guards wore traditional uniforms with 400 folds in the skirts representing the 400 years of oppression the Greeks experienced under Turkish rule.

We also went to the first modern olympic stadium, built in 1896. It is made entirely of pantelic marble, just like the buildings on the Acropolis.

We went on an intense hike late that afternoon up a hill/mountain across from the Acropolis. On the top of this hill was a little church to St. George, and this is the site we had our first class meeting, in a manner of speaking ;)

We had a stray dog become an honorary memeber of our group by making the intense hike with us both up and down. I dubbed him Trooper because let's face it he totally was! We went to dinner after at an adorable little taverna. It was at this taverna that I learned that every toilet in Greece flushes differently, so it became an adventure every time to find the button or lever. On our walk back to the hotel we stopped at the Benaki Museum, which was open until midnight. The staff were really nice and let all of us in for free (there were like 22 of us!). This museum had all sorts of exhibits that included neolithic tools and pottery, some classical pieces, and even clothing from the 17th-19th centuries.