Thursday/Friday, Sep. 29/30 - The Oracle of Delphi and Temple of Apollo: Athens

view from our mtn top CG at Delphi

sunset view from Delphi CG

Why is it that the Greeks and Romans had to build on the tops of remote mountains????  all that climbing!!  And it seemed like we were driving the back roads of Colorado.

Stanley at the Temple of Apollo (6 columns restored)

restored treasury (offering) of Athens to the Temple of Apollo

In the afternoon (to miss the tour buses carrying hordes of tourists), we saw the museum and archaeological site of Delphi (Delfi).  A few pictures attached.  Stan seems to get into everything.

pediment of a treasury building (Hercules on the right)

Greece is certainly having economic problems.  We notice a general slowdown in activity in comparison to Turkey, which is a bustling and progressive country.  In Greece, by comparison, there are many incomplete road construction projects.  There is also a whole lot of graffiti, especially along roadsides, on road directional signs, which makes our navigation even harder.  Another difficulty is the Greek language.  Given enough tine (several hours!) I can make out the names of Greek towns written in the Greek alphabet; many places have 2 separate signs - one in the Greek alphabet and the other in the Roman alphabet.   Also, each town has several different spellings (on signs, on the atlas, in our log).  We are getting to be quite expert in manipulating the GPS.  BTW the roads here have multiple highway numbers on the maps, but the road signs do not use these numbers (except for interstates); you need to know the name of the next major town in the direction you are going.  If you are reading this, you can know that we successfully navigated into Athens and arrived at our latest campground on Friday, Sep. 30.
Tonight we taxi downtown to see the lights on the Acropolis and have dinner.