Mainland Greece - Athens and Thessaloniki...

Day 11 – Sunday 5 April

We arrived in Athens at roughly 1:00 am, got our bags, and found a nice, cozy spot in the airport. Laura was able to get the most sleep out of all of us – she came equipped with a blanket, eye coverer, and ear plugs with her. I was able to get several hours of sleep off and on, but I spent a majority of my time reading Memoirs of a Geisha. Hannah and Jess didn’t get hardly any sleep. We weren’t the only ones in the airport using the seating area as a makeshift, free hotel, so it was not too awkward, but we still receive our fair share of odd looks. This is not a surprise, since there we were, four young women lying on the floor of an airport surrounded by four very large back packs, plus computer cases and bags of groceries. Though it was not the most comfortable place to stay, it does make for a good story, especially with the “how you doing” story…
Eventually we all woke up, brushed our teeth and attempted to make ourselves look presentable before heading out to find our way in Athens. We bought train tickets into Athens, but were immediately confused as to how to get there, because we spoke no Greek and could not figure out the train stops and transfers that would get us to Larissa station, which is where we needed to get. Tired, grumpy, cold, and hungry, we eventually gave up on figuring out the train system, bought some bus tickets, and took a bus into Athens. Once in Athens, we went to find the train station that we were going to leave that night from to go to Thessaloniki. Train station found, we tried finding the hostel that was going to store our stuff for us for the day, but once again got lost on the way because we did not understand any of the signs in Greek and no one spoke English to help give us directions. We made a rush decision to just find a hotel to stay at because we didn’t want to have to walk all the way to the hostel and we didn’t want to have to spend the night at the sketchy train station. A few blocks from the station we came across Hotel Nana, and on a whim, decided to check price and availability. There was accommodation available for four that was within our price range, so we took it. We ate lunch there before heading off to the Acropolis. There we saw all the old Greek stuff that is pictured in history books and seen in films… it took us only a few hours. It rained, but it didn’t ruin our fun; we were kind of goofy after lack of proper sleep and travel frustrations, so we took silly pictures instead of paying much mind to the history of Athens. Then we went back to Hotel Nana to eat dinner, relax, and have some nutella while watching 4 hours of Malcolm in the Middle with Greek subtitles. By this point we were extremely exhausted and very slap happy – which ended with Hannah falling off her bed.

Day 12 - Monday 6 April

We woke up early to walk with all our luggage through pouring rain to the train station, where we bought our tickets and caught the morning train to Thessaloniki. The train was crowded, and so we had to separate to find seats. We soon discovered that apparently seats are assigned; we concluded that we were not given seats because we purchased our tickets so last minute. Since o one around us spoke English to explain to us what was going on and how the train system worked, we decided to just hunker down in seats until we got kicked out. Hannah and I were lucky enough to pick seats that were never reserved, so we never got kicked out. Jess and Laura each had to move at least five times to stand or switch to different seats as people got on and off the train. Despite the frustrations with the train system, the six-hour train ride was beautiful, going through mountains and along the coast. When we arrived in Thessaloniki, we were greeted by Megan, Hannah’s friend and roommate from Eau Claire.
We started our time out in Thess by first dropping Hannah and Laura’s stuff off at Megan’s apartment and then by finding mine and Jess’ hotel. Transportation went much smoother now that we had Megan with us, and we easily found our hotel, checked in, and dropped our bags off. In the lobby, we met some guy, Pete, from England who was travelling by himself, so Megan invited him to come along with us for crepes and a walk along the water, where we watched the sunset. After that, we went back to Megan’s apartment and ate dinner, Pete included. Then Megan, Hannah, and Laura escorted me, Jess, and Pete back to the hotel. We said goodbye to Pete, who actually lives very close to Winch, so we might meet up with him sometime in May when we are all back from our travels. Jess and I spent the rest of the night just talking and hanging out in our room before going to bed.

Day 13 - Tuesday 7 April

Jess and I met up with Laura and Hannah at Starbucks to fuel ourselves for the day. We spent the day exploring Thessaloniki. First, we walked up this giant hill that had a beautiful view of the whole city and the Aegean Sea. Tired from the hike up the hill in the heat, we spent quite some time just sitting on a bench, admiring the city view and talking, before exploring the rest of the top of the hill. Then we went through the process of finding a taxi to take us to Megan’s school – it took forever to find a taxi that was willing to take four people all the way there. Finally a nice taxi driver took pity on us and agreed to take us wherever we needed to go, but because he couldn’t understand English very well, he had to call his daughter. His daughter then talked to Hannah to find out where we wanted to go and relayed the information back to her father. That done, he took us to A.C.T. (Megan’s school) Hannah, Jess, and Laura played volleyball with Megan and the school team while I, the unathletic one, watched and cleaned out my rather large purse, a task that had been looming in front of me for some time. After volley ball practice was over, Jess and I headed back to our hotel. Back at our hotel, we got ready to go out to a Taverna for Megan’s birthday celebration dinner. Tavernas are basically a Greek version of a pub; you can sit outside, surrounded by tons of lights and other tavernas and people, and order lots of different food that can be served family style. The atmosphere around tavernas is very festive; there are twinkle lights all over, live music, laughter, and employees from all the different tavernas come out and try to convince you to eat at their tavernas. It is quite amusing! Tavernas definitely made the Greece experience better, and it was great to meet some of Megan’s school mates and hear their travel stories and experiences!

Day 14 - Wednesday 8 April

We went to a Halkidiki beach called Pefkohori with Megan and some other girls from her school. The bus ride there cost 10 euro each way and took about two hours one way because the beach is located in one of the northern fingers of Greece, but it was worth it! It was the perfect day for the beach – sunny with clear blue skies and just a slight breeze. Supposedly it is one of the most beautiful beaches in all of Greece, including the islands. Although it was not as beautiful as it will be in the summer, it was awesome to laze around there for about six hours before we had to catch the bus back to Thessaloniki. When we got back to Megan’s, we made dinner, which Megan accidently dropped on the floor when checking to see if it was cooked through; not the slightest phased, everyone else said to just put the food back in the pan and to finish baking it. They ate it; I didn’t… but only because I couldn’t eat it because it had gluten in it. I did try a small taste, and it was still scrumptious despite falling on the floor!

Day 15 - Thursday 9 April

We all decided it would be good to have a morning where we could sleep in and take care of some things, so Jess and I did not meet Hannah and Laura until noon. Once we all met up, we toured the White Tower, which apparently is the main landmark in Thessaloniki. The museum in the tower was somewhat interesting, and allowed us to go to the top of the tower. We liked this, since we like our city views J The hours after that were used to provide us with some shopping time in Aristotle’s Square, which is the bustling center of Thessaloniki lined with tons of shops. I started feeling sick, so I then went back to the hotel that evening while Hannah, Laura, and Jess went to play volleyball again at Megan’s school and then get gyros. I took the solo time to pack, get some things done online that needed to be done, and to call my dad. The phone call turned into a 3 hour conversation, which was good because we got to talk through a lot of different things. Jess, Hannah, and Laura got back to the hotel late that night. Jess and I finished packing while Hannah and Laura hung out in the lobby waiting for us. Jess also ended up booking another hotel in Rome because she felt guilty about sneaking four people into a 2 person hotel room, which is understandable. We were all a little frustrated, because it ended up costing us a lot more because we had to pay for two rooms instead of one, but at least we could have guilt-free consciences. Once we got all our luggage together, hotel plans straightened out, and other last minute details taken care of, we took at taxi to the airport. We slept for a little while in the airport, then got on our 6:30 am flight to Athens. In the Athens airport we slept some more before getting on our flight to Rome. Guess what we did on that flight… yup, we slept. All this little naps amounted to approximately four hours of sleep; that would have to sustain us for the day… because there would be no time for sleeping at the next stop on this crazy adventure for us… ROMA!!!