My phone calls me “goddess” so it’s not surprising Athena and I have so much in common. Sure, she has an entire ancient city named after her, a unique origin story, and the adulation of millions, but we could totally be besties.
Of the Big Cities we’ve explored, Athens might be my favorite*. It was shiny and clean and stuffed with Greek ruins and good food. I was surprised to learn that when I was in high school, Athens was Europe’s most polluted city. It has literally cleaned up its act with car-free zones and driving restrictions. At 33°C (in the 90s!), it was bearably hot, compared to the 45°C it will be in height of summer.
My favorite part of a city is the afternoon we arrive and Dwayne and I savor our first taste of a place, usually by walking to the nearest and biggest green spot on the map. In Athens, we stumbled across Hadrian’s (yes, Hadrian, again!) Arch and the ruins of Zeus’s Ridiculously Big Am-I-Compensating Temple on our way to the National Garden, before we had a family dinner under the lights of the Acropolis.
It was a delicious first bite of Athens. Four-course meal tomorrow!
*Eleven million people call Greece home, and almost half of them live in Athens. So, when I say we saw Athens, please read that as “We explored the square mile or so around the Acropolis” and count that as Athens.
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