Greece Part IV: The End

Saturday was my last full day in Greece and I had already gotten many of the major sights out of the way so I had to decide what was left that I was interested in seeing. The first thing that came to mind was the ruins from the Temple of Zeus. I had passed by them everyday, walking towards the sights but never stopped in. All that was left of the temple were 16 columns (only 15 of which are standing because the 16th was blown over by a heavy storm in the 1800s). It was pretty to see but there wasn't much more that was interesting in the surrounding area.

After that, I checked out the National Gardens behind the Parliament building with its beautiful fountain out front.

The National Garden was very large and peaceful. I liked wandering around in it. There were statues and little lakes and ponds and even a "zoo" (it was called a zoo but it was mostly just a bunch of fenced in farm animals, especially chickens). Anyway, I decided to sit down and relax there a bit so as not to get overtired.

After the garden, I went to go check out the Byzantine Museum. I took an art history class a few semesters ago and found it really interesting and since we talked about some byzantine art I wanted to go see what was at this museum. When I got there, there was a sign saying that all the exhibits but one were closed. I figured I might as well go see what it was. When I walked in, I could kind of see into all the dark rooms where there was actual Byzantine art, but when I got to the open exhibit it was strange. It was like a modern perspective on Byzantine art (like people from the 1990's who did Byzantine-style artwork). This is just a guess though seeing as everything was in Greek. All I could make out were the years of the pieces. That was a disappointment. Afterwards, I decided to head to Syntagma Square to get some lunch. Syntagma Square is the center of the Athens. I got a circular piece of bread with sesame seeds all over it. They sold them all over so I decided to try one. I kind of thought there'd be something more to it but it really was just bread and sesame seeds. I liked it though.

After that, I headed over to the National Archaeological Museum. I wasn't sure if I wanted to go but I saw online that it was one of the great museums of the world so I decided to check it out. It was interesting to see all of the stuff there.

After that, I wasn't feeling so well so I went home and took a nap (yeah, I know that's pretty lame for the only time I'm in Greece). The next day, my flight didn't leave until around 2pm so I decided to wake up early and climb Levitakos Hill which is said to have the best view of Athens. It was quite the climb and very very windy, but it was a beautiful view.

I flew out to Vienna with no problems and then had a really long layover and a slight flight delay. That delay put me into Geneva kind of late and I couldn't get to my hostel. I ended up spending the night in the airport. It was a horrible night but I got back home nice and early the next morning!

Overall, I'm very glad that I went to Greece. It was so beautiful and warm!