Athens, Greece & the Island of Hydra

After an incredible stay in Istanbul, Samantha and I headed west a bit to Athens.  We figured this would make a great stop before meeting my Dad and Cindy in Croatia at the end of the month,  and we were right.  I had never been to Greece before, while Sam had but only for one rainy day back in college so it really felt like we were both exploring it for our first time.  Athens is a really beautiful city so full of history and culture, which made for days full of museums and walking tours through the ancient city.

We stayed in a great little apartment right below the Acropolis, which meant that we got to see the gorgeous ruins anytime we left for the day.  Most of our days started with quite a bit of walking, we wanted to make sure that we were able to see as many sights as possible in our four nights.  One ticket gets you access to all the major ruins in the city, including: the Acropolis, the Temple of Zeus the Olympia, Ancient Agora, and Aristotle's Lyceum.  While probably the least visually impressive, the history of the lyceum was very awesome.  Samantha was super smart and downloaded some Rick Steve's guides, to both the Agora and Acropolis.  It was really helpful to get all the background info, and if you're not familiar with Rick Steve's, his nerdy humor is definitely worth checking out.

After a few days in Athens, we decided we wanted to spend some time on Hydra, a small island about 2 hours by ferry from Athens.  It sounds pretty obnoxious to say we needed some R and R but we definitely loved the sleepy pace.  There are no cars or even bikes on the island, just some donkeys that are used primarily for hauling things to restaurants, hotels, and shops on the island.  There are some small beaches that are mostly accessible by water taxis or daily shuttles.  We spent three nights here, but easily could have spent weeks.  After a quick ferry back to Athens, we spent a night before heading north to Meteora.  More to come soon!