Leaving the Wonderful Marianna

May 20, 2009 post

Yesterday was relaxing as planned. We spent a few hours at the pebble beach near our hotel. The water was brisk, but nice once we got used to it; and very easy to float/tread water in. People really like to swim there. I mean swim. There were many older men in bathing caps doing distance swimming, and then hanging out with their buddies. Jan, Jim and I all treaded water in a relaxed way and took in the sights. The funny part was watching each of us try to get out of the water. The pebbles became rocks right off shore and the water dropped off sharply. All of us stumbled and acted like tenderfoots getting out of the water. (Everybody did.)

The hotel did laundry for us. The first time my jeans had been washed on the trip. That was great.

We went to lunch at a restaurant recommended by Alex and Antonia. It was old country. The old guy ordered for us, including drinks. Jim had to catch him and tell him they were vegetarian. We got a beautiful big Greek salad, really garlicky tsatiki, bread, and big hunks of lamb and french fries swimming in olive oil. It was sinfully wonderful! Jim and Pat got green beans, zucchini, potatoes and cabbage rolls that were all great too. When we paid the bill, the guy asked us if we had dollars. We all checked to see and Jan ended up giving him a ten as a souvenir for his granddaughter. We walked away wondering how we fell into that trick. But the meal was great and very reasonably priced – so Jan felt fine about it. Jim teased him mercilessly.

We stayed at the hotel for our last night there, just talking and enjoying the space. We met some other Americans from Hawaii who were really fun. And our little friends Harry (4) and Joseph (8) from England entertained us with their toy car collection. I felt the effects of all the swimming-in-oil food, but Tums helped ease that by the end of the evening.

I have to spend a few lines describing our last breakfast at the Hotel Marianna. We all agree that they have the best yogurt we have ever tasted. And we've had some good yogurt in Turkey and Greece. This yogurt seems to be made from whipped cream. It is light and fluffy and cream and rich and just plain wonderful. All of us ate it every day we were there. I had it with honey; Jan with apple/orange marmalade. To die for!

We had to leave Hotel Marianna today because Rick Steves (Europe through the Back Door) was bringing a tour there to stay. It got a little tricky – we couldn't figure out a way to get to Delphi from Nafplion, so decided to go to Athens a day ahead of plan. We couldn't get into our hotel yet, and couldn't find anywhere else to stay either. Finally we had Petros (one of the four Zotos brothers who own the Marianna) call for us. That took one call and we got a place.

We rode the bus into Athens today. It has become clear to all of us over the course of this trip that we run on different clocks and to the beat of different drummers. (I've been humming the Buffy Springfield song, “You and I travel to the sound of a different drum...” for days.) We finally caught the 11am bus and got to Athens at 1:45 or so. We caught a city bus further into town and then for some reason decided to walk the mile and a half to our hotel with all our luggage. Athens is a huge, crowded and dirty city. We were all cranky by the time we got here.

Once we got settled and hydrated, we walked the ruins below the Acropolis. The Stoa of Attalos was quite beautiful, as was the Temple of Hyphaestus. We took in all we could in about 2 hours. We were starving at this point. We had a really fabulous dinner, strolled back through all the street vendors and came back to crash.