Oasis Suites Glyfada

... enough for 70,000 people.<br><br>Bekah and I were pretty worn out by that time so we made our way back to Syntagma Square. We couldn't find any quick and cheap Greek food so we ended up at the McDonalds as we each got a chicken sandwich and chocolate milkshake from the Euro menu. By the way, my chocolate milkshake was not very chocolatey...sad day. But it filled us up, and we took the hour long train ride back to our hotel, satisfied with our day seeing ancient Greece!

... in Greece in the nineteenth century, and the gardens were created beside the palace as a royal refuge by Queen Amalia (who was Bavarian). The monarchy was eventually run out of Greece, and the Royal Gardens became the National Gardens, and the Royal Palace became the Parliament House. We took lots of pictures at Hadrian's Arch and the Temple of Olympian Zeus, and then it was on to the touristy Plaka district and up to the Big Attractions: the ...

... the vegetables yourself and print out a sticker to put on them, before taking them to the checkout counter. Everywhere else in Europe, the checkout chick weighs the vegetables - and the instructions to do this (if they existed) were definitely not in English. I looked at her obnoxious, patronising expression in disbelief. I've never been served by someone so hostile. If you were that rude in ...

... the emotional exhaustion of being a coiled spring all day. I'm grateful that Mary Lou and Wedding Belle invited me to go along with them, I never would have braved all of this by myself (and perhaps they would have had a more difficult time without someone who spoke a little Greek). It's about an hour ride down to Glyfada. As soon as we saw water, we hopped off the tram at the first beach. Mary Lou was starting to feel faint, so we had lunch at the taverna of a beachfront hotel ...

... reckoned they would just stand on the beach and throw rocks at us. Saturday we cruised to the most amazing island with a beautiful cove where we spent the day doing watersports on the exquisite blue velvety sea. We were in heaven but also a little sad that the week of lifestyles of the rich and famous was coming to an end. Our wake up call was booked for Sunday at 6am. Our plan was to have a lovely breakfast, take our time and be ready for our transfer at 7.15 back to the ...

I'm sure there is far more to see in the birthplace of Zeus, but today's flight ends back in the city of Athena. It begins with heat. Into the 80s by 9 and climbing above 90 by midday. I'm showered, packed and caught up on e-mail and decide to tempt fate with an omelet and croissant, my first solid food in over 48 hours. I read a bit in a cafe, but even in the shade it's a bit too much and with an ...

... something despairingly similar. Au contraire. A light fluffy pide style bread, a thick yoghurty chive butter, whole hunks of tomato and exquisitely marinated sides of meat made a gyros as close to gourment as EUR1.30 food can be. I disgraced myself and managed to put away four per day on average. Always a positive sign when any fast food establishment stops asking for your order but just takes your money and hands you over what they know you want. We also spent ...

... Laurie pulled him out of his cocoon and got ready to disembark! Laurie was aware of people gathering their bags about 2 hrs before we should have and when she asked a crew member he told her that we were only an hour from Patras! WOW, we totally missed the fact that we had a 1 hour time change and a good thing as we would have been scrambling for the dock. The good thing about being first on the boat AND keeping an eye on everything is that we were ...

... in (in a daze) and after a quick nap, headed out for a stroll. The name Santorini was given to it by the Latin Empire in the thirteenth century and is a reference to Saint Irene. Before then it was called Kallistç ("the most beautiful one"), Strongylç ("the circular one"), or Thera. The island was formed after the result of one of the biggest volcano explosions in the world. Historians say that the legend of Atlantis was based ...

... but several upscale restaurants offered fares from others more distant lands for those who had had their fill of souvlakas, moussakas, and greek salads. With only a few days in the country we did not fall into this category, so after we had hemmed our last haw we settled down in a quaint street-side eatery right in the heart of the tourist district. Better meals were certainly available in the city, but for the money we shelled out the traditional Greek fare went down well ...