Hanging out in Athens

I had promised this day to Emily as a slow day when she could sleep late and catch up on some needed rest. Majella rose early, had breakfast in the hotel and headed off to her conference. I lay in until sometime after 8:00 when Emily stirred briefly and I told her I was slipping out for some breakfast.

I headed up the nearby central market and picked up a kilo of peaches for 0.60 euro. On the way back I bought coffee. The woman who served me offered Greek, filter or instant coffee. I said Greek but, when I saw the look she gave me when I declined the offer of sugar with it, I backed off and went with filter. I must try the Greek sometime.

Emily was still snoozing when I got back to the hotel. She continued that way through the morning while I worked on web pages and a few other things. I slipped down to the hotel Internet point sometime after 11:00 to upload pages and deal with some email. When I got back to the room Emily had stirred sufficiently to eat some of the breakfast that we had bought the previous evening.

Sometime after midday I managed to persuade Emily that we should go out for a look around the local area of the city. We walked up Athinas street towards Omonoia. Emily wasn’t much interested in looking at the markets but I did draw her attention to some boxes of snails.

She was much more interested in the pet shop that we found and insisted that I photograph some of the furry and feathered creatures. She thought the starlings, with their bright yellow eyes and sharp beaks, were a bit frightening.  Among the birds inside we saw a galah with a 5000 euro tag. At that rate some farmers back home might be better to sell the galahs than the grain they eat. By the time we reached Omonoia, not far from the pet shop, Emily was concerned to wash her hands. We ducked into McDonalds but came out by a different door and I took insufficient care with the directions on a square with 8 streets leading out of it. Some time later I realised that we were not heading in the direction that I thought we were. We backtracked to the square and headed back to the hotel for Emily to take another rest.

I spent the rest of the afternoon as I had the morning but around 6:00 pm I managed to persuade Emily that we should go out for another look around. This time she took along her camera and got some shots of the animals in the pet shops and other local sights. She developed a “love-hate” relationship with the pigeons in one of the squares. She was fascinated by them and wanted to get close for photos but was easily bothered if one swooped close to her.

Eventually we went back to the hotel to see if Majella would come back from the conference or call about dinner. She had planned to attend a session that did not finish until 8:00 pm so we waited until about 8:30 pm before going back out into the square to buy dinner. Emily had McDonalds and I settled for a chicken giros and a beer at a place on one of the squares.

Majella returned after 9:00 pm. She had dinner with some others from the conference but had plans to join Tony in the Attalos Roof Garden Bar for a drink. We went up and enjoyed the views of the city and the illuminated Acropolis by night. Emily continued to rest up for what she was planning to be a more active next day, with an early start for a trip to the beach.