I was in Athens in late November. While I had been in Athens before, it was a long time ago (about 14 years or so) and with only one day for sightseeing. Since it had been a while, I basically did the same tour again, visiting just the main attractions on a Saturday.
But I also had the Friday evening off, so I went to Piraeus. While Piraeus is best known for its large ferry harbour, from where most of the large ferries go to the various greek islands, there are also smaller harbours around the peninsula. One of them is Mikrolimano, which looks a bit like it belongs on one of the greek islands. A couple of ships, but mostly a bit of coastline filled edge to edge with restaurants.
Here's a Quicktime VR panorama:
If you scroll the panorama a bit to the right, you can spot the 'sattle' roof
of the "Peace and Friendship Stadium", which hosted the Olympic volleyball games in 2004.
A bit further to the right (about the middle between the stadium and the moon),
you can barely see the Lycabettus and the Acropolis hills.
While the previous days had been a bit cloudy and cold, the sky cleared up for the weekend, which was a bit of an unexpected bonus, since you get this nice almost unreal looking clear blue sky, where you would get mostly hazy views in the summer heat. And it was warm enough to walk around in a t-shirt. And there were fewer tourists than in summer.
First stop was at the Acropolis. Since I always get confused: The Acropolis is the name of the hill, the Parthenon is the biggest building on the hill. The building with the well known statues (Caryatids) is the Erechtheion.
Here are some pictures of the Parthenon:
And this is the Erechtheion:
Some views from the Acropolis:
Of course, no visit to the Acropolis is complete without some cat picture...
Lycabettus Hill as seen from a busy street corner does not look nice. Moving on quickly...
Next stop on the way was the Temple of Zeus (or what is left of it).
Onwards to the Zappeion Megaron exhibition hall and the odd sculpture that hangs in front of it.
Then through the national gardens for another generic cat picture...
...before taking the funicular up to Lycabettus Hill for some more views over Athens, only to note that Athens is less a city with a character, but more a landscape filled with houses. Nice open air venue, though.
Since it is late in the year, there aren't that many hours of daylight. I wonder whether I should stay and watch the sunset from Lycabettus Hill, but then decide to go to the little rock next to the Acropolis instead. On the way, I pass the Herodeion or Herod Atticus open air theatre with the Parthenon in the background, lit nicely by the setting sun.
I reach the rock in time for sunset and some more views of Lycabettus hill.
Dinner below Acropolis closes the day.
