Finale: Beach, Gardens and the Movies

Today was our final day In Greece. We slept in a little bit, then hatched a plan. First, we went to the market for provisions.  I got partially scolded for not stopping at the end of the produce aisle without weighing our bananas. Whoops! They do that here. We walked to the Temple of Zeus ruins and did a lap. Then, we found the tram. The city public transportation system consists of buses, subways and trams. We took the coastal tram south (and managed to pay properly!) outside of the city limits where it proceeded to rain.  We stopped for lunch at Goody's, a American style burger place that isn't particularly fast.  Then, we walked to the beach. I insisted on putting my feet in, even though I didn't take off my hoodie.  

It was nice to relax on the beach and the sun even peeked out. We knew the weather was iffy but figured the train ride would be nice. It isn't exactly beach season here yet, there were still some die hards around, fishing and swimming.  

We found our way home and wove our way through the gardens near the Parliament. They were lush and green, but there was an absence of other colors.  After a gelato break in Plaka, we arrived home to change for the movies.

I did some research on an ex-pat site online to find a movie theater that would be showing The Great Gatsby in English.  Using google maps, we found subway directions. Unfortunately, google gives Subway stop names in all capital letters and in Greek. Greeks give subway stop names in Greek with a mix of capital and lowercase letters.  Between the linguist and the mechanical engineer, we had been able to identify enough Greek letters to find our way to the Athens Metro Mall.  

The mall was typical and we found our way to the movie theater which was dead.  We reserved our seats and wandered through the mall a little before the show started. There was a wellness fair going on so before the movie, a woman was performing a stripper pole workout routine on a stage, and after the movie, there was a giant Zumba class.  The movie was good. Very Baz Luhrman. 

We are mostly packed and drinking beer in our room while watching tv. Tomorrow morning we are heading to the airport and I am heading home, while Jenny is off to Amsterdam.  

This trip was so awesome, but I'm excited to go home. I am ready for laundry and my TiVo. I think this will be my last post, so thank you for reading!! 

Photos:

Temple of Zeus

The Beach

Cheers!