Piraeus and Athens, Greece (Itinerary)
We'd been here on both the world cruises, so be
sure to visit those pages (this link
to the 2015 trip also links to the 2012 trip) because we did
different things this time around. We started the day in the terminal
to get access to the Internet before the crowds slowed it down.
Little did we know that it wouldn't really start until 9am when
someone showed up in the office to turn it on. And so it goes...
 
We'd seen the small group of merchants on the the walk to the
train station before, but this time we stopped to take some different
photos.
 
This butcher shop had hung a vast array of sausages, peppers,
garlic and more in front of the store and from the ceiling inside.
 
A sad girl was stuck selling garlic with her family. Laces were
displayed at another storefront.
 
We stayed on the train until we saw some leftover Olympic structures
from the 2004 games. The long archway was used as an agora or
marketplace during the Olymics. We'd seen some other venues when
we visited previously, but we had not seen these.
 
This had been the swimming venue. We were pleased to see that
the pools were still in use, but the rest of this space was pretty
much a wasteland.
 
We set up our picnic on one of the many tiled tree rings where
a tree was still living so we had shade. No flags flew from the
poles on that day...
We think Greece must have lost some really big money because of
hosting those games. Maybe it was even the beginning of their
current financial situation.
 
We rode the train back toward the center of the city and then
found the Athens Flea Market.
 
We were amazed at this collection of medals and awards.
 
Nearby, it seemed appropriate that the church's mosaic was of
Jesus throwing out the money changers from the house of worship.
 
We laughed at this impossibly small truck totally loaded down
with building materials and although we'd missed it twice before,
this time we found the central market.
 
While there were the standard cuts of meat, there were also tripe
(stomach) and the intestines, which we saw in use last
Easter in Katakalon, where people used them to wrap the organ
meats around their secondary spits to augment their whole roasted
lambs.
 
Some of the workers were anxious for us to take their photos.
The Central market is quite large and is divided by product, so
all the fish was in one section and all the pork, beef and veggies
were separated.
 
Nuts and spices were mostly with the produce.
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