Athens and arrival at heraklion

So on Monday I arrived at Athens found my way to the metro and took it down to the station at syntagma, where I knew I had to get on another metro line, I just didn't know where that metro line was. So I got off, at first I simply got onto the same train (it looked like a different train I swear...) then I realized I was on the wrong train so I decided that there must be a different metro station nearby (wrong). So I walked outside and found myself at this gigantic pinkish building, With guards with skirts, tights, and shoes with pompoms on the tip (apparently that's where they hide their knives... I found out later that the guards were guarding the tomb of the unknown soldier, which is In front of the parliament building. So I walked around a bit until I realized that the metro station had MULTIPLE LEVELS each with a different metro line. I'm smart. So anyways I finally arrived completely exhausted at my hostel, and basically just went to sleep.

The next morning I took a walking tour of Athens that leaves from my hostel everyday at 10am,And was supposed to last for about two and a half hours for 5 euros. First stop was the temple of Olympian Zeus and hadrian's arch. The temple was once the largest temple in Greece, but now only 15 Corinthian columns remain, as it was a main target for enemies. Hadrians arch was built by a roman emperor with an obsession with everything Greek. Unlike other roman arches this arch was not decorated with sculpture, instead it only had Corinthian columns (the origins of these columns are appropriately the city of Corinth. We visited a stadium called

the panathenaic stadium, the first stadium there was built quite a while ago but the one there
now is only from about 1896. We then visited the national gardens followed by the parliament building where I saw the changing of the guards with the pompom shoes (that is their name now). We then went to what I think wAs mitropolis cathedral but I am probably wrong. The coolest part of that was that it had a byzantine church which had roman/Greek sculptures that they stole but put crosses on any with pagan themes such as nudity. Also saw a statue of constantine the great. We stopped at the market for lunch as well. We then went to hadrians library with fresh strawberries in hand, as well as the roman agora. Finally we went to the acropolis and concluded our tour (4 hours later) and a few of us went off to explore the acropolis. It was obviously amazing. The statues of the women were beautiful although i previously thought that they were larger, but they were elegant none the less. The pantheon is extremely large and you can still see some of the sculpture on the pediment, even though the british stole the rest. We went back to the temple of Hephaestus in hopes of a better view, then to the market. We ate there and I had the best Greek salad, with a large block of amazing feta cheese (yum!) and we went back to the hostel and then to Piraeus

After almost getting lost we arrived at the place I caught my ferry to iraklion and I said good bye go the people I met at the hostel. I got on the ferry which was like a 4 star hotel, had some real baklava (so much better than Canadian baklava) and some iced tea that tasted like soap lol. Anyways I arrived in Heraklion safely and my hotel is wonderful and I get three beds to myself Woot! The staff there are incredibly helpful and I'm going to take a tour to chania and rethmyno tomorrow for 38 euros.I'm also 3 minutes away from the beach!!!! Woohoo!!!! I think I'll go check that out today.

Overall I'm having a great time and with everything I've seen already I feel like I've been here for a week, not a few days :)! I'll attempt to post some pictures later!