Athenian Finale

Our final day in Athens provided a chance to roam freely through the city of Athens.  We toured the Acropolis Museum, built on top of current archeological excavations, with glass floors so that visitors can see the progress below.  On the top level, the building is built to scale with the actual Parthenon, so that the stone reliefs with sculptures of parades and battles can be presented on the walls themselves.  Tourists can walk around the life-size model, columns and all, to see how the reliefs were displayed in the past.  Our group was extremely excited when we realized the design.  Later, our group parted ways and explored the city's markets and other historic sites. It was extraordinary to imagine the possibility of walking in the same footsteps of Socrates, Plato, or Aristotle; we even found a spot that might have been where Socrates sentenced to death along with the ancient stoas and other ruins.

 


Ryan and Xavier participated in the Cape Sounion dinner excursion, which included Temple of Poseidon tour, the inscription of Lord Byron's name is a trademark of the site.  Unfortunately, the column on which he had done so was so worn and had so many other names carved on it that very little could be seen of the original and far more famous piece of vandalism—or the original column, for that matter.  The others spent the day exploring the city of Athens and experiencing the local culture, seeing many small sites not mentioned on the tours, including various details in the Athenian Agora, or market, from ancient times.  However, all adventures must come to an end; our party reported to our hotel in Athens before a remarkably early morning departure for the States. It seemed that EF designed the trip so that our hotel quality increased from one hotel to the next, as our final hotel in Athens was spectacular. We flew out of Greece under the dark of the early morning.  Only two flights and a brief layover in Paris stood between us and our homeland for Memorial Day cookouts and the comfort of the familiar.  Our overseas adventure was done, but the experience will remain with us for the rest of our lives.