So um yeah, I went to Greece in April…..and I’m just now getting around to writing this blog post.  Whoops! I’m headed to Costa Rica for a week in exactly seven days so I thought it might be a good idea to do this before I head out on another grand adventure.  If you didn’t already know, Greece is AMAZING!! It was so great in fact that I will be blogging about it twice.  This blog will feature our first few days in Athens and the second part will feature Santorini.  Who did I go with you ask?  Well I traveled with two of my amazing photography gals, Dani and Emily.  They of course are overachievers and already blogged the Greece trip months ago just to make me look bad….just kidding! I’m sort of glad that they did because now I can just read their blogs to jog my memory as I’m writing this.  They tell some funny stories so check out their versions of the Athens trip here and here. I arrived before the other girls because they were flying from Boston instead of DC.  The directions in a foreign country are always interesting.  I somehow managed to navigate the subway by myself and then had to find our flat by things such as, “turn left at the church”.  No name, just “the church.” “Take the 3rd right around the bend.” You get the point.  I don’t like traveling alone but I must admit it does make me feel sort of cool to fly to a foreign country on my own and prance around a little bit while I wait for my friends to arrive.  I’ve had to do this in Ireland, Quebec City, and Spain for various reasons so I guess I’m sort of used to it.  When I arrived, the place we were staying was amazing! We could see the Parthenon from our roof. Enough said.  You can check it out here.

As always, all of these images are available to buy as prints or canvases for your walls.  Contact me at ashley@ashleymichellephoto.com if you would like more information.

I think it will be easier for me to tell short stories above each photo so you understand what is happening/the story.  And please make sure you go to the end because the end is the best and most amazing part of our time in Athens.  Here goes….

The Happy Train is probably the best way to see the city of Athens.  Typically I much more enjoy the big hop on/hop off bus tours for big cities but Athens has some very narrow roads that the big busses just can fit through.  The only downside is that there isn’t any commentary.  I sort of like to hear the history of what I’m seeing. Before going to see the Acropolis in person, I highly recommend that you visit the Acropolis Museum first.  Then, when you do see the Acropolis in person, you will actually know what the ruins are supposed to look like and the history behind it.  There is a lot of reading that needs to be done, but my advice (if you are like me) is to travel with someone who likes to read everything and then have them paraphrase for you.  I have always outsourced this on my travels and it has worked out nicely.  Thanks Dani and Emily! Really cool theater called Theatre of Dionysus that we came upon on our hike up to the Acropolis. Stray dogs are literally EVERYWHERE in Athens.  It is very, very sad.  The dogs actually look sad. I asked someone about it and they are considered community dogs and everyone takes care of them but they belong to no one.  They don’t have shelters in Athens. Remember when I said go to the museum first?  This is why.  The Acropolis are ruins and as much as the country of Greece is doing to continually restore these beautiful pieces of history, there are still parts of it that have crumbled.  The scale of these structures were amazing! It is so crazy to think that they were able to build these buildings so many years ago without any of the modern resources we have today. Sort of obsessed with this picture and this view of the city of Athens from the top of the Acropolis.  Oh and also, we could see our flat from the top.  Sort of cool. This is my friend Dani.

These are some of the pieces of the ruins that are laid out by the people who are responsible for constantly repairing the Acropolis.  They literally find these pieces and put them back together like a puzzle.

This is the Odeon of Herodes Atticus. This is Dani’s new friend.  He is one of the men that stands outside restaurants and begs you to come inside and eat.  These men accomplish their goals in many different ways: yelling, flirting, stalking, giving away drinks/appetizers, etc.  The restaurant that this man is associated with was right next to the place we were staying so we would see him at least 3-4 times/day.  By the end of the trip, Dani and him were best buds.  And we did finally eat at his restaurant towards the end of our stay.  He was happy so a picture next to the Happy Train seemed appropriate. We were in Athens right before Easter which is a holiday in Greece that is bigger than Christmas is in the US.  This was a couple of days before Easter at a church. People are supposed to be in mourning from Good Friday until Easter so the churches are packed constantly with people praying and lighting candles.  The church bells also ring constantly beginning at 7am.  The bells don’t ring normally though–they ring off-key and deep.  They are meant to sound mournful and they definitely do!  It was such a cool experience to be here during this time! It is a thing to go and watch the changing of the guards at Parliament so we went.  It was interesting to see but nothing too overly exciting.  I did like their outfits though.  I still can’t get over how guards can stand there with a straight face when people are staring at them.  I could never have this job. During the day, the streets of Athens were alive with tourists shops, art stores, clothing stores, etc and then (like in most European cities) at night, everything shuts down and the shops turn into facades of buildings.  It looks like nothing was ever there.  The transformation is sort of cool. Food vendors were everywhere.  Grilled corn and nuts were two of the big ones.  I ate some of the nuts and they were delicious. I absolutely LOVE stumbling upon “real life” in foreign countries.  I think observing things like this really give you a sense of culture about a place.  We were walking through a part and found a pick-up soccer game.  You can’t really tell from this photo, but most of them weren’t even wearing soccer cleats, but just regular tennis shoes.  I found that interesting. I think this might be my favorite photo that I took of the Parthenon. The night before we left to go to Santorini was by far the coolest thing that we experienced in Athens.  Beginning at 9pm, thousands of Greek people go to the hundreds of churches within the city.  They light candles and march together to symbolize Jesus’s funeral.  They march all around the city before converging at Parliament to hear the Greek Pope speak.  It was seriously one of the coolest things I have ever been a part of while traveling.  Every single street was completely backed like this! Obsessed with this picture!  And of course, even when traveling, I love the dark, moody pictures the best. The Greek Pope speaking.  There were so many people around and they were speaking in Greek so it was hard to tell what was going on, but it was really amazing to be in the atmosphere nonetheless. Another absolute favorite! Old people and the dark–two of my favorites! Stay tuned because, Part II about Santorini will be coming very, very soon!!