The Acropolis, Athens

Better late than never (perhaps), these are the last of the photos from my trip to Athens late in 2008. Facebook has been starving the blog of updates for a long time and I’ve all but lost the capability to think of anything to say that’s longer than 140 characters.

For anyone keeping track, this post is a follow-on from the previous trip to Aegina.

The Acropolis is definitely the centrepiece of Athens and you catch glimpses of it from numerous streets and allleyways. It’s saved from being completely swamped by the sprawl of Athens around it by virtue of the huge rock it sits on:

The Acropolis as it looks from the approaching road:

On the way up to the Acropolis you catch glimpses of the most famous of the buildings there, the Parthenon. It’s “one of those buildings” that has to be on every architecture student’s pilgrimage route at some point:

The entrance to the Acropolis complex, which does a good job of only offering you partial views of the temples above:

And here’s the same view, but with Ann providing scale. (Hands up if you thought the doorway was really that big):

A view of the temple of Hierocles, and the surrounds of Athens, that you get from the entrance:

The steps leading up to the temples. “Steep” was a word that came to mind:

The Propylea in the Acropolis itself:

Ann enjoying the obligatory scaffolding:

The Propylea, with scaffolding. They always know when I’m visiting somewhere and scaffold it up specially. I’d be disappointed if it was any other way:

The Parthenon gets cranes as well as scaffolding. Although this is otherwise a pretty classic view, and we were lucky enough for it to be fairly empty – the benefits of a fairly early morning in December (when it was still warm):

Some pieces of Parthenon frieze that they leave around the place until they can work out how to put the 3D jigsaw back together again:

The Erechtheum:

More Erechtheum. Athens definitely excelled at blue skies too:

From inside the Erechtheum looking out. I bet the original builders never thought “this is going to look great when it falls down”, but it does:

The Erectheum entrance porch:

An arty shot of an Erechtheum column:

The ceiling of the Erechtheum porch:

The Erechtheum as a whole:

The east side of the Parthenon itself:

And the whole east front of the Parthenon:

Some of the frieze sculptures that us Brits decided weren’t worth carrying back to the British Museum. (Travel hint: don’t make that joke in Greece. They don’t like it.)

Some more Parthenon:

You can see some of the wall sections of the Parthenon behind the columns. It seems strange to think of it being a solid box inside now that we’re used to seeing it as ruins:

More frieze sculptures:

Turn the scaffolding up to 11:

The classic shot (albeit with scaffolding still):

The hill outside the Acropolis where some famous Christain bloke did some preaching. (Apparently his name was Paul, but no idea what his surname was.) It’s well dangerous up there, as you can see by Ann being frozen with fear:

A tree that had managed to grow itself out of the rocks:

And this is how the Acropolis looks at night. It’s worth finding a cafe or restaurant with a view for a few hours at least: