athens to kefalonia 2010

[john]

It really sounds like a great experience. I have long wanted to try getting to Kefalonia via this route but as usual, i take the easy way! Maybe this will give me the impulse to try it.
Thanks for sharing this with us Kaz, and glad you had a great time!

[kaz]

We sort out the relevant paper work, we are given the swipe cards for the room. We enter the room, little one comments wow this is posh!!!! Shortly afterwards suitcases arrive in the room, we are shown how to use the electric (anything is done by the cards).

Its a mad rush, to see who gets the first bath - Jim wins, I'm second and the little lady is last. We find the mini bar (its got chocolate in it!!!), the room is pretty large and has carpet throughout (after my fall in kefalonia i have taken not to wear footwear on tiled floors).

Everyone has bathed and changed, we are feeling much better. We want to hit the town!!!!!

The area we stayed in is called the kolonaki, just down the road from the hotel is the concert hall and the american embassy thou the area is busy, it looks a reasonable area.

We leave the hotel directly in front is a small little chapel, which is rather sweet. We turn the corner, there's a couple of shops, a kiosk and surrounding a fountain there is seating for a couple of coffee places. We walk on pass the American embassy which is heavily guarded.

We come to the Metro
We purchase 2 x adults tickets(which you can travel for up to an hour and half all around Athens) for 1 euro, then we purchase a ticket for the little lady which was for the same amount of time for a huge sum of 50 cents. We wait, not completely sure where we are heading or in which direction we should be going - oh well we find out we have gone the wrong direction. We get off at the next station, laughing our heads off.

We go to the monastiraki area, where we have our first view of the acropolis. Its extremely busy, there's little side streets heading off in all directions, with little shops whom sell all kinds of things (mainly for the tourists). We wonder around not really taking much notice of time, or where we are actually going. We then headed up towards the Plaka, where there are lots of taverna's sadly I really dont like it when they hassle you to come in and try, so we walk on pass.

All around Athens you see street sellers, some had splant balls - which caused us to laugh as each time a tourist walked passed so the seller would throw the ball with force and make it splant onto this old bit of board. Also you would get groups of South African sellers, there would be a group of twenty or so hanging around street corners, looking for buyers. But also for the police, who would take all the stuff they were selling.

We finally find somewhere to eat, with direct view of the acropolis which is rather nice. We watch people walking passed and generally just relaxing after a hard day. When the little lady spots a couple in the corner kissing (oh my goodness!! shock, horror she is rather disgusted with this).

We go for a little stroll, then decide we would head back to the Hotel. This time we catch the right metro train.

[suej]

Sounds really exciting perhaps I'm a coward but you seem really brave I dont think I could do all that.

[Phil]

A great read Kaz ........ thanks ............ I really must try it next year.

Phil

[kaz]

We collapse for the night.

Its breakfast time, the most important meal of the day -one of don Giovanni restaurants are within the restaurant. The restaurant is very lavish, everything is white table linen breakfast is laid out and literally the choice is huge. Its sure is a breakfast made in heaven (as one little girl describe it) especially with all the chocolate. It must have taken at least an hour and a half for breakfast.

Finally we get out for the day, we head again to the Metro this time we buy two adult tickets which last for 24 hours which cost 3 euros each. We decide to get the little lady a ticket for a hour and a half again. These tickets you can use on the trams,buses,metro, suburban railway.

We get off at the next metro station Evangelismos station, we are heading towards the lycabettus hill, we walk passed the British embassy and beyond that point there's loads and loads of steps (not the best idea when you have a bad back) we eventually get to the top, after a few stops.
In front of us is about thirty students all waiting for the funicular, it appears that the funicular and shop and tickets are manned by one person. We are up at the top, the view is amazing, you can see all around Athens at the top there's a old man selling a few novelty items, plus a little chapel called Agios Georgios. It was a bit more expensive than we had thought, but we discovered the price we had heard was for the trip only going up. We would have liked to have walked down as it looked lovely.

Anyway we head back to the metro station we decide to go to the Syntagma station, you come out just in front of the Greek parliament building, we go to see the evzones (the greek soldiers in skirts and pom poms) where we have our photos taken. After this we decide to have something to eat.

For now this is where i will finish