After about 14 hours in the air, we finally touched down in Athens. The original plan had been to fly in early and see the sights before our cruise ship left. From what I saw of Athens and the fact that the other members of our group who did fly in early, were robbed in the hotel where we would have stayed convinced me that at least on this trip the extra money was not wasted.The nicest part about Athens was the even though there were 4 people who arrived on the same plane heading for the same cruise ship, there was a mercedes waiting for each couple rather than a crowded bus or van to take us to the cruise ship. AH, now I'm feeling like a rich European cruiser. The picture above shows my first view of Athens. This is the parking lot at the front door of the airport that was lined up with the most motocycles I think I have ever seen in one place at one time. This photo was taken of one direction, the other direction was just as full of motorcycles.
Once we loaded into the Mercedes, we were off to a running start through the streets of Greece. Though the speedometer was in kilometers I know we had to have been traveling close to the speed of light weaving through traffic all the while. AND I found just as many motocycles on the road doing the same thing. Here's a picture from the back of the car.
Whenver I did get a chance to look up and around, and I know this isn't being fair to Athens, but all I saw was brown buildings and dirt. I just asked my husband what his impression of Athens was and he answered with one word, "dirty". He was impressed, however with all the solar powered water heaters on almost every building. As we neared the downtown part of the city, things not only got dirtier but they got trashier too. It looked like homeless people were everywhere (no wonder my fellow travelers got robbed).The redeeming view was as we rounded a downtown corner and saw our first glimpse of our cruise liner, our home for the next 10 days. Home Sweet Home away from Home.
