The truth about Athens

I discovered that Athens is not really a great vacation destination. Greece may be, but not because of Athens. In fact, besides a lot of shopping, the main thing to do in Athens is check out the Acropolis. If you plan to visit Greece plan a day at most in Athens and then get to one of the islands or any of the coasts.

I toured the Acropolis and was a bit disappointed since the place looked like a construction site. On the north side they have a huge shop that is being used to cut stones for renovations that have been going on for a couple of years, apparently to fix the mistakes made by other renovation attempts made in the 1920's and 30's. I find it amazing that the Greeks of 2300 years ago were able to construct something that lasted this long, and yet the technology and knowledge available in the 1930's was not good enough for something to last longer than 70 years without needing to be fixed again. Progress?

Because of the renovations almost all of the Parthenon is surrounded by scaffolding, which you can imagine makes for a great photo op. I actually had my camera with me but discovered that I didn't have a memory card in it... no matter, a post card or pictures from 10 years ago would do the site much more justice since it isn't littered with cranes, scaffolding, workshops, etc. So, basically the one thing to do in Athens is almost not worth doing right now. It does provide a nice view of the city, but you can get just as good of a view and an even better view of the Parthenon (since it's from a distance) from the nearby observatory. I actually had a great view from the roof top restaurant of the hotel I was staying at. The lights surrounding the Acropolis are pretty impressive.

Random facts about the Acropolis - basically some tidbits I got from Wikipedia to fill in some of the holes in information given at the Acropolis.
1. There are a couple of buildings on the Acropolis. One is the temple of Athena Nike. Nike means Victory and was a small, but apparently important, Greek goddess that was very fast and could fly. Phil Knight, the founder of Nike Corp. got the name from the first man he hired who had a dream about the Greek goddess Nike. I'm not sure what that guy had for dinner, but it worked.
2. The main structure is the Parthenon. Back in 1687 it was used as an ammunitions magazine by the Turks and a cannonball from the attacking Venitians caused a huge explosion. Until that point the Parthenon had been extremely well preserved.
3. There is a stone wall all the way around the Acropolis, which made me wonder if the mountain was actually built up and wasn't as high as it is now. Apparently it was built up by landfill over many years which is why the top is relatively flat. If you want to know more about the Mycean age and the history of the Acropolis check it out at Wikipidea which is a great source of info for those who haven't discovered it yet.