Not so far away....

I'll be back...

or better said I'm back. This last eastern holidays instead of staying here "...donde el cielo siempre gris, donde la lluvia es arte..." I decided to travel to a place a little bit more warm and sunny.

Therefore and as flying is, statistically speaking, the more safe way of traveling, I put my personal safety in the hands of the commander of this nice technological wonder. I know it is not the Millenium Falcon, but now, seriously, will you really thrush your life to the flying skills Han Solo ??? (rhetoric question, don't need to answer).

If someday you also think about a nice place to scape from the crowded catholic countries during the eastern time, I seriously recommend you to visit an orthodox country, like Bulgaria  or Greece. You will not find so many people around, the weather should be nice and the people are (usually) friendly. After a easy flight we arrived to the modern Athens's National Airport. And here started the surprises.

The government of Greece has voted in the last weeks a new Pension Law, which was no so welcomed by the population and the country was (semi)collapsed by a general strike. The repercussions of this were actually almost non perceptible for me. Yes, there was not train from the Airport to the City, well, fair enough, there was the regular bus. The time of the trip was the same (more or less) and the price half of the train's price. Not really a problem.

The view of the city was less pleasant as should be due the huge piles of garbage which were standing almost everywhere as General Strike means really general, therefore it has not been anyone collecting the garbage for the last days....

During my time there the strike was still going on, but all the main touristic places were open, even (or of course) the souvenirs' shops. I suppose every European has quite good knowledge what to expect to be able to visit in Athens: the Acropolis with the Parthenon and the Porch of the Caryatids on the Erechtheion. The place is the "start" of the city and be prepared to find quite a lot of humans humming around. I was there on a Saturday and it was pretty busy, mainly with Spanish- and French-speaking people.

But there are also some places and museums which deserve a visit. The main museum is the National Archaeological Museum. There it is possible to see several examples of sculptures,  weapons, jewelry and pottery. The famous "Mask of Agammenon" is located right on the centre of the main room on the ground floor. All around there are several rooms with nice pottery and grave objects.

Further into the deepness of the museum we can find more steles from graves and statues, some of them casted in bronze, like the also quite famous of Poseidon. Really huge and impresive.

Maybe less known is the War Museum. There it is possible to see a chronological display of the Hellenic military from ancient times to the modern era. 

The collection is not enormous big, but there are several sculptures, maps and paintings which are quite informative. Also the collection of weapons includes some nice oriental pieces (even a Japanese armor set).

Another place to go is the Kerameikós, an ancient cemetery, which has been a burial ground since the 12th century BC. The graves were placed on both side of a main road, close to the main road to the Acropolis, the Panathenaic Way. So, for the people it was possible to see the grave monuments and burial steles from the road. During the ancient times, there were several laws regarding burial customs and grave monuments, which only allowed for the construction of small, discrete monuments. 

However, in occasions  some of those laws were not respected. So and due to the high amount of bodies to dispose as result of the plague which suffered Athens during the Peloponnesian War, a common grave without any kind of monument was used. In other occasions those laws were banned, at the rich athenians were able to construct nice and elaborated grave monuments. Today, the place is quiet and a very nice spot to walk around and rest for a few minutes.

The ancient places and touristic spots are all of them located in a very small area and it possible to go almost everywhere by feet. This is specially true in the case of the ancient places, as the ancient Athens was not so big, the actual one has around 3 million inhabitants.

Further words about this incredible city another time (maybe)....