Athens

Athens, Greece

January 2015

Four days away

Me and J

By British Airways

Stayed at King George Hotel

What I read:

Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

The gist of it:

I wish I had written this post as soon as I got back from Athens. Similar to Rome, the city is a layer cake of history. The Acropolis towers over every view and around every corner there is another ancient marvel to take in. Between the outposts of history, the modern city is less impressive. I expect it would be hard for most people to fall in love with Athens at first sight, which is so easy to do in European cities like Paris or Barcelona, but that should  not takeaway from everything it has to offer.

We had a great trip. I highly recommend going to Athens in the middle of winter because the attractions had no lines and the restaurants and bars were full of Greeks. The city has a great energy – the only obvious evidence of the country’s recent hard times, in my opinion, are the graffiti plastered over every surface and the stray dogs, of which there are many, though they all seemed to be docile and well fed.

We booked our trip through the BA sale and so got a great deal on the hotel. The view from Breakfast, which was an impressive array (!), was of the Acropolis and it was in the middle of the city. We spent our four days exploring and eating – we saw the Acropolis, the Temple of Olympian Zeus, the Ancient Agora, the Panathenaic Stadium, the Acropolis Museum, the National Archaeological Museum and walked up Filopappou Hill. We also went to Central Market. Mediterranean produce always makes me greener with envy than the perfect lettuce leaves on offer. However, the men selling their wares were not abashed when it came to staring (ladies be warned).

There were also loads of cool coffee shops and bars to check out – my favorites were Taylor Made (coffee, cocktails and cool Athenians) and Barley Cargo (for beer lovers).We also had a bunch of great meals. I have listed my favorites below.

Top restaurant recs:

Cafe Avyssinia – tasty Greek fair with very friendly staff! It was a great place for lunch.

O’Thanasis – We went to this no frills gyros empire twice. I could eat souvlaki for days.

Manh Manh – more expensive and filled with less Greek people than most of the place we ate, but very tasty.

Photos:

 #streetart – there was no shortage in Athens

 Different corners of the Acropolis

 Views of Athens from the Acropolis

 

J in the Roman Agora

City Streets and Ancient ruins    A turtle  The Panathenaic Stadium

 Temple of Olympian Zeus  Central Market The Acropolis from Filopappou Hill  Our experiment with a self timer  The view looking towards the sea from Filopappou Hill

The Ancient Agora

NH in September

Southern New Hampshire

1 week away

With J

September 2014

By Avis

Stayed at my parents’ house

The gist of it:

This was mine and J’s third trip to my parents’ house in Southern NH in the late summer/early fall. Unfortunately, it was not as warm this time around, so we spent a lot more time hiking than at the lake. Most of the photos are from our hike up Mount Monadnock. We hiked the white arrow trail, which was fun but much steeper than most of the trails I have hiked up Monadnock. We also took the kayaks out a few times and saw a fledgling bald eagle on Nubanusit. I also got to show J just how many types of squash there are in America.

Pictures:

Mount Monadnock

From the top – that’s Boston in the distance

J going down

Beautiful Rosaly’s

And once again America begs the question, how much ice cream is too much ice cream?

Kefalonia (V)

On our last day I was determined to go paddleboarding. I had seen the paddleboards on the rocks at our hotel on the day we arrived but for some reason waited until the last moment to take one out.

I’d only ever been paddleboarding on lakes in New England, but the ocean near our hotel was not particularly rough and it was really easy to navigate.

On our last day, we saw clouds for the first time (!). And although everyone at the hotel was like ‘I am sorry it’s such an awful day,’the clouds did not take away anything in our view.

Top Recommendations:

Our hotel! The Emelisse was a wonderful place to stay and had everything we wanted and needed.

Paddleboarding, just in general. To everyone at all opportunities.

A Constellation of Vital Phenomena. Definitely my favorite of the books I read while I was away, but admittedly not much of beach read.

Pictures

Paddle boarding from the rocks at the hotel.

The view from our hotel, even beautiful with clouds.