Athens Impressions

Athens hotel: Marble House Pension

• Lovely owner who gave us maps and sightseeing recommendations
• Inexpensive and within walking distance of major sights
• Thin walls... experienced when the inebriated Australians on our floor locked themselves out, chatted merrily at the top of their lungs, and then vomited copiously.

Acclimating to Europe

This was my first encounter with a European shower: a tiny square of porcelain, water nozzle on a hose, and two drains... one in the tiled bathroom floor, one in the "stall" itself. Want some walls, or a shower curtain? No way. And hot water? Well... maybe if you're lucky.

Another common sight in Europe: the scooter. Scooters zipped between the multiple lanes of street traffic, often jumping up to the sidewalk to circumvent slow spots and scatter pedestrians. We saw lots of crazy scooter driving in both Greece and Italy. What we didn't see were helmets!

Athens itself

Our first day in Athens fell casualty to monster jet lag. On our second day, we woke up long before anything was open and strolled down the Dionysiou Areopagitou and Apostolou Pavlou. These streets, which border the Acropolis, were redone for the 2004 Olympics. Flowering bushes and trees lined the wide cobblestone avenues, perfuming the air with the scents of sage and sugar. We had the ruins mostly to ourselves--and we certainly didn't mind sharing with that tortoise.

Outside of this area, Athens was an exhausting blend of the ancient and modern. There were many Greek Orthodox churches and squares--not landmarks, just a beautiful part of the city.

Athens was HUGE! The city seemed to spread forever, a mix of bustling thoroughfares and narrow back-alleys. Even from the vantage point of the Acropolis, we couldn't see an end to the buildings.

It seemed that everyone in Athens smoked. There was an ashtray on every cafe table, and the smell lingered in the air--mixing with the oppressively sweet odor of rotting garbage. Also prevalent in Athens: feral cats. The stray felines were everywhere... in the streets, on porches, or hanging out at the ruins. The only exception was the Acropolis; apparently, only tourists feel compelled to climb that high in the heat!

Revote

I put the top two pictures on the sidebar, so we could see them small. Which do we like--bridge background, or Tuscany background?

The Power of Yard Work Parties

Thank goodness, it's not a jungle out there... not anymore, at least.

Check out these "before" and "after" photos and you may understand why we're so grateful to our parents for showing up. Thanks to both families for donating your trucks, tools, and time to scraping back the layers of awfulness in our front yard.

Our parents turned the driveway from Dandelion Central into a place we'd actually be proud to park our cars:


As for the transformation from Curbside Eyesore into Non-Embarrassing Bare Flower Bed... well, that took a little longer than one afternoon... (This one's worth clicking on the picture so you can see how bad it was originally. No, really.)


How did we tackle that shrubbery mess? It took months, but only because we get distracted very easily. It went a little something like this:

Step One: I cut out all of the old plants--including one sad, scraggly fir tree. There was also an initial weeding. (Note: weeds grow back if you don't, you know, put real plants in the bed. Who knew?) As you can imagine, this created quite the yard compost pile! (The picture is just one part of one hedge...)

Step Two: Mike dug out most of the stumps, but we had to hire a stump grinder for the tree.

Step Three: Our parents came over to help us weed and level the flowerbed, which we'll be covering with weed-block (and planting next spring). They were so energetic, they even moved on to some of the other flowerbeds, picking weeds that you can't see from the road. (So thorough!)

Thanks for all the help, family! We'll be sure to call you when we get brave enough to tackle the backyard...