Ancient Agora

First day in Athens and we’re going to just wander.  I can tell that

John is chomping at the bit, this was his place he wanted to go to on this trip because it’s the home of philosophy.  But he plays it cool and allows us to just meander around the heart of Athens.  We leave our horrid little neighborhood and walk through places that look even worse with graffiti everywhere, stores closed, a place that looks awful.  We do find a delightful little bakery on our 

way into town and Oscar has to get a second donut because he likes it so much.  John and I find pigs in a blanket and crack cookies….Danish wedding cookie things made out of almonds, butter and coated in powdered sugar…so very healthy.  We keep walking and walking and fall into the Kerameikos area where the gates leaving Athens were located and the potters had their places.  It’s a huge cemetery and was outside the walls of the city, one gate 

led to Plato’s Academy and there is more pedestrian areas here.  We find the “Acropolis Loop” as Rick Steves’ calls it and finally get a view of the Acropolis.  John and I are left stunned, Oscar could care less.  He wants to know if we’re on a our way to the “hypogeum”.  Hell, John keeps calling it the “Pantheon”, so we’re totally confused on this trip.  It’s Saturday, so a market with tables of wares are setting up along the path and these are fun to see.  We climb a little ways up Mars

 Hill and find out that it’s closed off, but we can see people at that the top.  We finally stop for lunch at a place with a view of the Acropolis.  Oscar wants spaghetti with just parmesan and we somehow make this understood along with a couple of draft Mythos beers and souvlaki, saganaki, and tenderloin.  We just sit in the sun, looking at the Acropolis feeling very happy with ourselves.  When we sit down to eat seems to be the only time that we take a

  breath and think about how great this trip is going and how incredible everything we’re seeing is.  Oscar inhales the entire huge bowl of spaghetti which shocks us both and we can’t fit all of our great food in.  We head toward the Agora entrance and make this our one stop today.  We have 12 days in Athens and everyone who has been here has said that it can be done in 3.  That there’s nothing left to

 do after that.  If we get bored, we’ll come up with some day trips, but we aren’t going to cram the birthplace of Western Civilization in 3 days.  So, we head through the Agora and it’s pretty sad how quickly Oscar is bored with it.  He can’t understand what has us so jazzed, the only thing he seems to like is “Kitty Hunt” where we all look for and point out cats that we’ve spotted among the ruins and running through the places kicking up dust.  He doesn’t seem to understand why John is practically 

crying realizing that Athens built a train track through the building where Socrates was indicted for corrupting the youth of Athens.  He just wants to know when the next train is coming through because he thinks that’s way cooler than a bunch of marble lying on the ground.  He does take some time to see Romulus and Remus suckling the she wolf on Hadrian’s breastplate of his statue that is there.  We head out of the Agora and

decide to try to head for home.  We get some groceries on our way home that take up the stroller, good thing we brought it.  But these streets all look alike, are diagonal from each other and we’re kind of trying to keep a trajectory for heading home.  We get close and we know that we’re within a block, but can’t seem to make out which identical apartment block with green awnings would be ours.  I finally ask a nice lady at a café and she says it’s two blocks down from where we are.  The sun is 

 starting to set and it’s good to be back in the friendly confines to rest our feet.