Day 186: Rest day in Athens

Parthenon, tick ✔️ 

Obligatory selfie

We were up reasonably early, but not early enough to beat the heat and climb up on to the Acropolis above Athens. We got to have a good look around the Parthenon, the Temple Erekthion and the Temple Nike Athena. All very impressive and elaborate for the age. It’s amazing there’s anything there at all really after 2,500 years and the restoration works to try to rebuild parts of the buildings are a mammoth task. 

It’s difficult to realise just how old these buildings are - predating everything we saw in India by centuries and more than 500 years before anything we might see from the Romans. 

We’ve come to the conclusion that the way we tour on our bicycles isn’t really a good way to see sights like this. By the time we get to a city like Athens all we want to do is put our feet up. Walking around trying to see all the big tourist spots is just too much effort, and there are so many annoying tourists around. Cycle touring is definitely all about the bits in between - the people you meet in the places in between the tourist stops. That’s what we’re here for. 

Still, it was worth the effort to see the Parthenon, we didn’t bother with any museums or any of the myriad of other sights worth seeing here. 

We have had haircuts too, which is good to get done. 

I’m going to put my feet up now - there’s cycling to do tomorrow.