Day 85 - Monday, March 31st, 2025 – Athens Day 2

In the pictures below you will see two different pictures of us getting off the ship. The first one is from day one. The second one shows day two. We look like drowned rats. That is because that's what we were, drowned rats. On day 2 we woke up to the room booming thunder and bright lightning. For some time we didn't think we were going to be getting off the ship. We had breakfast in the room. We actually waited on 4 for several minutes to see if the rain quieted. Because we said we were going to meet Katrina and Derek at 8:40, we decided to go forward. We put our Alaska jackets over our head and walked the 1000 feet or so to the cruise terminal and then the 200 or so feet from the cruise terminal to the van. In that short amount of time we got soaked. Actually, our jackets got soaked. We were pretty dry under our jackets. That's how we started our second day in Athens.

Today's journey was to take us to the temple of Poseidon. I don't know exactly how far it was from the port but it had to have been somewhere near 70 or more kilometers. It took a good hour to get out there. It was pretty scenery as we pretty much followed the coastline east to what would become the southernmost point of Attica. As we got closer, in the distance, you could see the Temple of Poseidon. It seemed to be on the highest point of the land. There were several switchbacks which took us 300 feet underneath it. Finally, Derek pulled into a parking lot which was situated underneath a small building. We got out of the van and worked our way up to the level of the building. From there we could see that it's still would take 15 or 20 minutes of going back and forth uphill to get to a point where I could no longer go. Thankfully, the surface was flat but it was all uphill. Like a champ, Mary pushed me as best she could up the trail. We got to a point where I could go no further. There's a picture where you can see long slabs that look like stairs. That's as far as I can go. It was still 2 to 300 feet underneath the actual temple. Like troopers, Mary Ann Katrina made the final track up to the temple itself. I sat by myself in the sun at the base of those stairs or probably an hour while Mary and Katrina tracked further up the path. I ended up being in a few family pictures because families crowded around me and took their pictures. I can only imagine search for conversations where the families would say who was that. Hopefully they came up with some creative stories. You can come up with a few of my soul, but I'm not part of that conversation. The sun was out and it was nice and warm period as they sat there though the clouds covered the sun and the wind whipped up the side of the hill that I was sitting on. I begin to get cold and hoping that Mary and Katrina would come down. Eventually, they did. They brought their tales of how it looked up there. You can see from the pictures there it was pretty neat up there too. In some regards, it was even nicer than what they saw at the top of the Acropolis. Mary talked about the number of steps she got to climb to get up there. Because it was so high you could see forever. It was really cold. It was that much more cool than it looked for me but I was only about 75% of the way up.  Personally, there was not a corresponding museum which discussed the history, etcetera the temple of Poseidon. I'm sure Katrina gave Mary an earful on the topic. I did not get that so I cannot pass it on. If you're really interested, Wikipedia has a very detailed description of it. Despite the good job Wikipedia does, it does not make up for actually being there. Trust me, I was there. 😊

It took a while, but we made our way back down the hill. Eventually we got to the parking lot where the van was. Because this was only supposed to be a four hour tour we loaded back up in the van and headed back towards Athens. Mary and I put in a special request to stop at a grocery store you know what we were looking for, right? Yes. Monster Energy. Mary picked up six cans of Monster Energy from Greece. The cans are actually in Greek. I'll have to take a picture or two. She also bought other kinds of potato chips, cookies. Then it was back to the ship. We got out of the van. We took our pictures with Katrina and Derek. Actually, their names were Katrina and Sakis –  Mary asked earlier in the day. They made a pretty good team. I would say that of all of the tour people we've had they were above average but not the best by far. I really think it was the language barrier that separated them from the others. They weren't bad by any means. They just weren't the best.

Around the cabin until we decided to go to dinner. On the way to dinner we ran into Dan and Lorna. Because we were going the same way we sat at the same table. We spent dinner talking with them. I had calamari for my appetizer. For the pasta dish I had the pasta the restaurant manager, Rapheal, was making. It is penny pasta. It's kind of nice combination of spices and olive oil. It tends to be a little bit oily, but it's not as strong oil so it doesn't impact the taste greatly. For my entree I had flounder which was really good. For dessert I had ice cream with caramel sauce.

Mary had salad times two. Still eating the cold soup, she had a blueberry and beet soup which she loved. For her entree she had a entree sized pasta. It was very good. For dessert she had a sorbet. It was a nice meal. We spent time with some nice people. We learned a lot more about them. Dan’s love of baseball seems to overrule just about everything. It sounds like they cut their trip short by leaving from Rome so he could get home and watch Detroit baseball. I hope that's not the case, but it sure sounds like it.

It was another full day. It was another successful day. We saw a lot more history. We saw a lot more of the countryside, which was beautiful. We spent time with folks who could be friends.