Avanti contracts with Conceptours in Athens. We were scheduled to meet at 9:30am for our walking city tour of Athens, but when we had arrived at our hotel the night before, we had a note waiting for us saying we would be picked up from the hotel lobby at 8:15am. That was it. No explanation. No phone number. So we thought maybe they were starting the tour early. Why else would they move our start time up 1 hour and 15 minutes?
Well, I guess we're gonna get adjusted to the new time zone in a quick way! We were up Monday morning, June 10 at 7am, giving us just enough time to shower, (re)pack, check out and check our luggage with the bellman, and grab a quick pastry and piece of toast from the fabulous breakfast buffet that was included with our hotel rate. We were sad to miss that, but little did we know, we had many fabulous breakfasts ahead of us!
A tour hostess met us, with a few other families, in the lobby and walked us a few blocks down the street and around the corner to...
a bus!
Yep, they had "upgraded" our walking tour to a nice, air-conditioned bus tour. Now, walking would have been fine with either of us, but we weren't complaining about the swanky bus accommodations. And by the end of the tour, we realized how wonderful it was to have that bus!
Our tour guide was Acimenia (my best guess at the spelling), and our driver was Serafin. We giggled a little about how Acimenia (and the tour itself) reminded us of the movie My Life in Ruins, which we had bought and watched before our trip. (Cute movie starring Nia Vardalos, by the way. I recommend watching it, but once is enough.)
Our first stop was the Panathenaic Stadium. This is the stadium constructed to host the first modern Olympics in 1896.
The stadium was built on the site of an ancient stadium that was used for the Panathenaic Games (thus, the name). Those games were hosted every four years, dating back to 566 B.C. (That's B.C., Y'all! As in two thousand five hundred seventy-nine years ago!!) Sometimes it is hard to believe that we were standing in a place with such a long - and grand - history.
Those Panathenaic Games, were similar to the modern Oympics, except that they were not all about athletics. While they included several sports, they also included a religious festival, cultural events, and competitions in literature and the arts. These Games lasted until the third century A.D.
At one time, the stadium seated 80,000 spectators. The current structure can seat 45,000. Maybe they just chopped it off at the front there? Or maybe the risers went even higher than they do today? Nobody told us, so that will have to remain one of the mysteries of Ancient Greece.
The obvious question is: how was this stadium used in the 2004 Athens Olympics? Well, here's your answer: it was used for the archery competition and the finish line for the marathon. We were told that currently, it serves as the start/finish line for many annual races, including marathons.
As with most locations in Athens, we could see the Acropolis from the front of the Panathenaic Stadium.
Add a little zoom...
Oh! There's a shot of our tour bus! Looks cool and comfortable, doesn't it?
Our little camera has a decent zoom on it. And clearly we were fascinated by the Acropolis.
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