Olympia

This was the one site in Greece I was really looking forward to. I mean you can't get more historic then the site of the first Olympics. The kids were excited too as we had just read The Hour of the Olympics in the Magic Treehouse Series. Though I think they were more excited about being in a place where Jack and Annie were then the actually site of the Olympic Games.

The landscape was just as I imagined it, in a beautiful field surrounded by olive trees. The actual site however was far more expansive than I had envisioned. Unfortunately, due to a series of earthquakes and destruction at the hands of barbarians and Theodosius I (who was one of the first Christian Emperors and considered the Games Pagan worship) most of the site is in complete ruins.

However, there are a couple of pillars standing here and there to at least let you imagine how immense the buildings and temples were.



The Temple of Philippeion


The Temple of Zeus - the centerpiece of the entire site


Entrance to the stadium


How often are you at a site of such significance where children running is not only allowed but should be done as a part of the experience. We burned off a lot of energy being Olympic athletes. (Even I did a little running, though Quinn did edge me out at the end of our race by a nose)

After your first Olympics, of course, there is much celebration so off we went to eat some Greek mezedes and do a little Zorba dancing. Take note that of course my son latched on to the hottest dancer there. Such a ladies man.

Mycenae, Greece

We said Ciao (but only temporarily) to Italy and set sail for Greece, with our first stop being Mycenae.

Mycenae, was a 2nd century BC Greek city that was said to have been founded by Perseus himself and ruled by Agamemnon. Today it is a mostly ruins set high in the hills south of Athens.

Our first stop at the site was the impressive Beehive Tomb, a cone shaped tomb inside one of the many hills surrounding the city.

There is Dad standing at the outside of the tomb. As an engineer, I think this site impressed him more than anything else we saw on our trip. Do you notice the massive stone on the top of the entrance that goes all the way inside? That is one (insert your curse word of choice here) piece of rock. One. Single. Piece. The picture really doesn't do it justice, it is MASSIVE. How people with no more than rudimentary equipment and pulleys and fulcrums got that up there is amazing.

The inside of the tomb, with that big 'ole rock.

Another engineering feat that my picture really didn't truly capture was the ceiling inside, it went up hundreds of feet in a perfect co-centric circle.

After marveling at the Greek engineering we got our walking shoes on and hiked it up to Mycenae's Acropolis.


(The fun fact I learned this day is that most Greek cities had Acropolises which literally translates to high-city. It was the temple which they would always put at the highest point to have a look-out point and so it would be easier to defend from invaders. The Acropolis in Greece, because it is still intact has sort of co-opted the name so most people think there is only one in Greece.)

Once at the top the kids pretended to be locked in a dungeon and they explored spooky passageways that I was a little nervous would end some rock collapse or snake bite.


The adults sat on rocks, enjoyed the scenery and marveled at all the history they were seeing.



The other thing I learned this day is that my children MUCH prefer ancient ruins they can climb on and run through than quiet churches and museums. Imagine that.

We then skipped forward a couple of centuries (to the 17th century to be exact) and visited the Palamidi Fortress nestled in the hills above Nafplion.


The fortress was built by the Venetians to ward off the Turks and the Ottoman Empire (our tour guide not surprisingly had little love for the Turks). With the structure much more intact than the ruins at Mycenae the kids had a lot more fun exploring and hiding in various room and tunnels throughout.
(Note the three rocks VERY precariously perched right above my children's head. I thankfully didn't notice that until after this picture was taken)

Raif (and only Raif could find it) found this tunnel in the back of the fortress and proceeded to take Greyson down this long, pitch black shaft (MUCH to my dismay). They were so far down in whatever dungeon they found that I could barely hear them talking and the only light they had was from the flash from Raif's camera. But all my worry was for naught (as it usually is) and the day ended with all fingers and toes intact and all children accounted for.

Next stop: Olympia.

Taormina, Sicily

Frankly, of all the places we had planned on visiting while in Europe I had put Sicily at the bottom of the list. I had this stereotype of Sicilians in my head and I hadn't heard anything really about the island itself so I put two and two together and said "Meh" to our visit.

Well here I am, eating my words because Sicily and Taormina in particular, is exquisite. Taormina, is an ancient city that sits atop a steep mountain overlooking the Ionian Sea. The city itself is gorgeous, out of an old fairy tale book, gorgeous. The two main streets of the town are lined with quaint little shops where you can get anything from porcelain Pinocchios (yes I bought one) to a brand new Gucci bag (which I didn't). Taormina is the vacation getaway for the European elite and the bay below the city was filled with yachts and boats that made my husband drool.


And if the city itself wasn't spectacular enough the views were breathtaking.

(View from the Ampitheatre with Mt. Etna (yet another highly active volcano) smoking in the distance.)


At the highest point in the city lies an ancient Greek ampitheatre, one of the oldest and most celebrated ruins in Sicily. The ampitheatre is actually still used today for outdoor concerts, which is pretty cool in a way, but the plastic benches and modern sound system rigging sort of takes away from the ancient ambiance of the site. I tried my best when taking my pictures to avoid any of the modern "add-ons"


Also, at the top of the mountain was an olive tree orchard where Quinn decided she needed a photo shoot.

I will say, though, that one of my favorite parts of the trip was that we happened to catch a Sicilian wedding in progress. Let me tell you, the stereotype, in this case, fits. The bride was in a BIG dress and she had some BIG hair. All of the female guests looked like they stepped right out of my junior high school yearbook in the hair department. And the guys....big sunglasses, shiny shirts unbuttoned down to the their belly buttons and the shoes....fancy, shiny, outrageous shoes. I really, really, really wanted to take some pictures but the grown-up in me held back and so you will just have to imagine the Big, Fat, Sicilian Wedding.

I would have no problem wasting a week in Taormina, shopping, swimming and eating and drinking. Sicily, you have a new fan.

Straits of Messina

We spent a morning and afternoon cruising the Straits of Messina. For those of you who don't know (and I didn't until I went on this vacation) the Straits of Messina is the body of water between the very end of the boot of Italy and the island of Sicily.

We woke up that morning to Mt. Stromboli staring at us from our balcony, welcoming us to the outskirts of Sicily. No not a giant Italian sandwich (which is also all I thought a Stromboli was) but rather one of the most active volcanoes in all of Europe. With minor eruptions almost daily it is called the "Lighthouse of the Mediterranean" While I would have loved to have seen it lit up at night it still was impressive with its smoke plumes and the kids were ecstatic to see a real volcano after we had just made one a few weeks prior.

Then it was on to Sicily and the tip of mainland Italy, which of course I had to be cheesy and touristy and take a picture of.....

(There it is, the very end of the Italian boot. Pretty much what you expected huh??)

Then of course my children kindly (well with a little bit of fussing) humored me as I dragged them to the top of the ship to take a picture of them with Sicily behind them....

and then ran them over to the other side to get Italy. Yes, it was quite a cheesy day for me and pictures but hey how many times are we coming to Sicily??

Rome

One of the greatest follies of our trip was our attempt to do Rome in a day. Ha!! You can't do Rome in a week much less a day, so we only saw just a few highlights but we will definitely be back. Though I am afraid that if I take Raif back he will really never leave. He fell in love with the city and I can't say I blame him. We spent the morning just walking around and getting lost. What was amazing was that you would walk down some random little alleyway that would pop you out into this beautiful piazza that you would never know was there. Everywhere you looked was breathtaking architecture. They have seamlessly combined old and new.




(One of the random piazzas - not even on our map that we stumbled across on our way to the Pantheon)


(The kids in front of Trevi Fountain)



(The Pantheon - Greyson declared the marble floor the perfect skating rink and proceeded to skate around the whole thing. I think the hockey analogy was lost on most of the other tourists there.)

(Vittorio Emanuelle II - monument. One of the last ones to be completed in Rome - in 1911. Apparently the Romans hate it and think that it is large and gaudy. Can't say I entirely disagree.)

After lunch we hit the two biggies of Rome - Vatican City specifically St. Peters and then the Colosseum.


Vatican City and St. Peter's Square were amazing, though it was hard to appreciate with all those pesky tourists around! I was however, disappointed with the actual Basilica itself. While the architecture and the art was amazing, it just seemed so dark and gloomy and doom-y. It was just drearier than I expected.

Greyson, did find his highlight of Rome in the Basilica. Apparently due to the beatification process going on with Pope John Paul, his body is out for public viewing. 6 year old plus a 'real live' (his words) dead body. The boy was in heaven (no pun intended). The whole Basilica was treated to my son shouting "Quinn, come here!! You want to see this dead guy!! It is a real live dead body!!! LOOK!!!!!!"

I wish I (and the kids) could have appreciated the Colosseum more but it was our final stop of the day - after 8 hours of schlepping the kids across Rome (which by the way they did phenomenally well at) in the summer heat, I was tired and they were exhausted. When we got to the top and looked out I explained to them what went on in the Colosseum back in the day.

"Cool, people got eaten by lions and killed each other. Can we go home now??"


Thus ended our day in Rome, but don't worry. We will be back.

Lucca and Pisa

On our way to Pisa, we stopped in the adorable little town of Lucca. One of the few cities in Italy that still has its Renaissance-era walls.


We spent about an hour just wandering through the Old City, with its narrow streets and gorgeous 14th century buildings.

The city also has one of the few remaining intact Roman forums (think Gladiator flights) which is now an open air market on the weekends.

(It is difficult to see in this picture but the kids are in the center of the Forum, with curved buildings behind them. Hard to believe that they are on the sight of countless slaughters.)

But the main destination of the day was Pisa, of course to see the Leaning Tower.


Pisa was not what I expected at all. From all the pictures I had seen of the Tower I imagined the Tower in a little farm town where the Tower was the only thing of significance near by. I did not expect Pisa to include two other gorgeous buildings.


Nor did I expect the THRONGS of people. It was a madhouse, with tourists everywhere and souvenir booths selling everything from plastic Leaning Towers to Duff Beer shirts (who goes to Pisa to buy Simpson's paraphernalia?) I really feel sorry for anyone who actually lives in that town, though I am sure that the residents stay far away from the Main Square at all times.

I am glad I saw it, a bucket list sort of day but I really have no desire to go back to Pisa.

Barcelona - One Last Note

The jet lag mind forgot one thing....

Of all the wonderful things we saw in Barcelona, what did my son like best about the city?? Using the bidet in the bathroom. That's a 6 year old boy for you.