Cruise 2012 - Athens - The Edinburgh of the South

The full compliment of Adams

Enjoying the metro

Relaxing after the stairs

Enjoying the fenicular railway

Emma and Roz take some time out to discuss the greek financial crisis (with food pilfered from the cruise buffet)

Black Family portrait

Enjoying the acropolis

Emma adopting her new favourite mode of transport - on Neil

Michael posing

Emma finds a new favourite mode of transport (they confiscated our buggy)

Some random dog - there were many of them in Athens

The journey down with Jamie and Grandma

I'd always planned to limit myself to one excursion on the cruise. I freely admit that I hadn't paid any attention to the planning, so when I found out what was involved in our Greece expedition I decided it'd be better if I didn't go - until Sarah vetoed that and convinced me that wasn't the correct choice. I'm kind of glad she did. It took two bottles of energy drinks, a lot of rests and 3 naps to get over it, but it didn't trigger a major relapse (worse case scenario) and made some good memories. It was great for me to be onshore with the kids as well.

Uncle Neil served his mission in Greece, so it was really great for him to get a chance to show us around. He tried to teach Michael some essential greek. This consisted of -

• "oki" - no
• "po po po" (with side to side hand gesture) - i'm not bothered/i don't care/whatever
• tutting with raised eyebrows and tilting head back - saying no (which seems really rude but apparently isn't)

He tried to teach him the word for dog, but that didn't stick. There were a lot of stray dogs roaming about.

We'd had our date changed for going to Athens as there had been a general strike. I'm glad it was changed, as it was a lovely place. 

Michael and Emma had a great time, but the place isn't designed with buggies in mind, so Emma had to do a lot of walking. 

We had a bit of a trek to get to the Metro, as the boat had dropped us off not near the middle of the harbour. We here heading towards a church on a hill in the middle of Athens which gave great views. This did involve going up a lot of steps then a fenicular train, which Emma and Michael loved. We came across a street market on our travels which was fantastic. The views from the church at the top of the hill were absolutely fantastic.

Following that, we got into some taxis and headed over to the Acropolis. Greek driving, like italian driving, isn't for the faint hearted, but it seems to work. 

Emma did her bit to help with the rebuilding that was going on by chucking some stones about herself. Michael seemed to enjoy climbing about on the big chunks of marble polished by centuries of people walking over them.

The general consensus was that it was a lovely day, and that the British should give back the Elgin Marbles.