June 3, 2017 Athens - Acropolis and Parliament

I woke early and set up my desk area in the lobby of the hotel.  I managed to finish all of my grading.  Whew!  So fun to sip coffee, and Greek yogurt with granola and drizzled with honey (gotta love the yummy photo of my half-eaten yogurt!).  Something about Greek yogurt in Greece! 

One of the many brave drivers traversing the narrow streets for an early morning delivery.  I wish I would have videoed, but it was Sunday morning, and there was beautiful singing in the background.

 Great people watching and street watching.  Amazing that cars fit down these little roads!

We finally woke the kids around 10 AM, had breakfast, and then headed off to the Acropolis - stopping for hats and sunglasses along the way...  

For our trip to the Acropolis, Lily was our map reader.  Caden was our photographer.  Gia made sure everyone remembered that it was hot and an arduous climb.

We made it to the top.  Resting with lemonade icies before heading in to the ruins.

One of the views looking down

By Lily

By Caden

We decided sunglasses were needed.  Now the kids are tragically hip.

After our amazing yet busy tour of these amazing architectural ruins, we headed back to our now favorite restaurant – Oinea.  Caden once again had the Greek meatballs, Lily the fish – which she enjoyed watching get de-boned, Gia the salmon again, and Corey and I had salad and a specialty dish of feta cheese cooked in a Greek phylo dough (beginning to wonder if “Greek” needs to proceed all items we eat here?!?, drizzled with honey – yes, Greek honey J).  We split a bottle of wine - again.  Rough life.  Watermelon and honeydew served afterwards.  Oy.  Then of course, more gelato...

The restaurant owner

You can see Caden's souvenir of choice- a fidget spinner - in the background.

The people at this restaurant are so unbelievable nice!  The sweet lady who owns the restaurant took the kids over to the side of the building to feed the wild cats the fish leftovers.

After lunch, we of course had more gelato, and then retired to our room showers and for napping.  Or at least Corey and I retired for napping.  Not sure what the kids did.  But pleased to see that once I woke up they had drawn photos of the sites at the Acropolis!  Especially since I have just realized that the photos are possibly deleted '_'

We then hustled across town to the parliament building to watch the changing of the guards.  I took entirely too many photos.  All of the kids now want floppy shoes.  I want to know how much this ritual costs.  Seems a bit excessive with the harsh austerity measures in place.

Notice the fidget spinner at the ready :)

Looking back at the Acropolis and the busy market area.

We meandered home, stopping at our ‘crepe place’ – known as such because we have went more than once, and then went home and packed up for our early journey tomorrow.