Athens & Ephesus

Yesterday we visited Athens.   It felt odly underwhelming, maybe because it's so famous.   There is some surrealism when you think about how old the city is and all the historical figures that walked the same ground you're standing on.   I was in awe seeing Mars hill, the rock where supposedly Paul preached to the Athenians.  Due to potential demonstrations at the university we weren't able to go to the national archeological museum.   I felt bad for Justin since he was looking forward to that excursion the most.   Instead they took us to the new acropolis museum, which we both enjoyed.  They have every artifact recovered from the acropolis on display.   The building itself was very impressive as well.   As they began construction they uncovered more of the ancient city and ending up building the museum on stilts with a glass floor so you could see the excavations.   Our guide said it will likely take another 10 years to finish finish the restoration on the acropolis & I believe it's already been going 20 years.  

We had a good lunch at a Greek restaurant with some very fun music.   They served us a Greek vegetable salad,  kebobs, french fries,  and a strange cake/dessert thing we couldn't identify.

Today we are in Kusadesi, Turkey.  We love it here!  The country is so beautiful.   We started the morning at the house of the Virgin Mary.  If that was indeed her final home I can see why she chose it.   It was at the top of a mountain and very peaceful with beautiful trees overlooking a valley.  Our next stop was the ancient city of Ephesus, the drive was breathtaking.  I was far more impressed with Ephesus than Athens.  Interestingly the Ephesians had to move locations 3 times due to plagues of malaria. What we call Ephesus was their final location which they inhabited for about 1000 years.  The city was very advanced and fairly large.   Their library was the most impressive & complete of the ruins.   They had just finished restoring the arch of Hadrian 3 weeks ago & it was really cool to see.   I thought it was interesting our guide told us they won't start restoring something until they find 60 percent of it.   Pretty much,  there's so many ruins here, they don't bother was how I took it.  We also visited St.  John's basillica where he is supposed to be burried & had a fun lunch at what they call an "amusement park".  Our last stop was a carpet demonstration which we heard would be high pressure sales, but it wasn't & we found it fascinating.   If we could trust Fozzie we would have definitely considered bringing one home!   Now we're enjoying the breeze on the boat & getting excited for Istanbul tomorrow!  I can't believe the cruise is half over.