Piraeus and Athens..... Part One

Our second Greek stop on this cruise and second stop too.  This is Piraeus at approx 7am.  

Taken a little later at Piraeus Harbour as the ship finished being tied up.  Aren't these boats a fabulous colour.

The buses are waiting.....we joined another tour here and were on bus number 6.  So yes, we walked around with our lovely number 6 sticker and followed Thanos with his little paddle thing that had number 6 on.  I have to tell you here...that Thanos started off like a wonderful tour guide as he has such a passion for what he knows in Greek history.  Only thing is we didn't need to know all of it on our tour.  We did come up with a couple other names for him such as 'Waffleofigus'.  Only because he would stand in one area and tell you so much detail.  At the start the group was polite and stood and listened and fidgeted.  After a third of the way through the tour however, half of the group would listen for a little then take a little wander.....come back and listen a little more.....off and look at something else and so on.  So this was a semi-self-guided tour. :-)

This was our view of Piraeus from the bus.

Athens University Museum

Just love the way this statue is looking down on this guy.  Also gives a size comparison.  This is one of the statues outside the Athens University Museum 

This is our first glimpse of the Parthenon area.  I was surprised at the number of steps we had to climb.

Looking out over Athens......a see of white.  This view extend all around the Athens Acropolis.

A structure my hubby spied when doing a wander away from our Tour Guide.

The Erechtheion, named for King Erechtheus, a mythological king of Athens.  This is one of the oldest buildings on the Acropolis.

The Parthenon which is a temple in Athens Acropolis.  This was dedicated to the Greek goddess Athena whom the people of Athens considered as their protector.  They started building this in 447 BC and was completed in 438 BC........ still trying to get my head around these types of dates.

Just sharing this photo to show that we were not the only people visiting the Athens Acropolis.  I must say I was continually amazed at the number of visitors to every place we visited.  Not quite sure what I expected....but not the amount that were here and everywhere as it was winter and freezing.  :-)  These places must get so very crowded during summer.

An amphitheatre we spied......

Another structure we saw and in Part two of this post I will show you a closer shot.

Just had to share this view of the Acropolis that our daughter took.  There were a few dogs up and around the Acropolis....they didn't bother anyone and seem to have tags on them.  We were wondering if they belonged to the guards that were working there.

Another fantastic shot that our daughter took......only she would see the only red flower up there.

See you in Part Two.

I just could not reduce my number of photos today.  It seems to be getting harder and harder.  There are so many more I would love to share with you.