It’s Moving Day — er, Month — at the Acropolis

by Martha Edwards on

I was irrationally excited for my first and thusfar only visit to the Acropolis eight years ago. A photograhy enthusiast, I was excited to get a great shot. And when I got there and scrambled up the hill to the top, what beautiful vista awaited me? Contrstruction. Yes, scaffolding, workers in yellow hats, orange fences … it was hard to find a nice shot, but I took a few snaps nonethless and vowed to get better ones on my next trip, whenever that may be.

So I can only imagine what kind of mayhem that’s been ensuing at the Acropolis lately — they’re moving, according to this article. Obviously, they’re not moving the actual Acropolis structure, but they’re moving all the artifacts from the museum next door, down the hill to a new museum that’s scheduled to open in 2008. In the meantime, expect cranes and lots of engineers on edge as they pray desparately that they don’t have to make any claims on their $568.6 million insurance policy. The move is expected to last six weeks.

The Best Hostels to Get Wasted In

by Catherine Bodry on

Martha’s post on her drunken debauchery across the globe got me thinking about the hostels I used to seek out in my infant days of traveling. Eager for familiar accents and the kind bonding that 10 hours of drinking will bring, I was drawn like a mosquito to juicy flesh to any establishment my trusty Lonely Planet profiled as “full of drunken American college students.” While those descriptions were probably meant to deter travelers from that type of lodging, they served as guiding lights for me. I’m a little bit ashamed to admit all this now, but at the time I fully embraced being such a cliché. (Although now I’m probably just a different cliché.) But staying at places like these made me feel a little less lonely (and a lot less sober). And I had a great time.

A few that come to mind are Balmer’s Herbage in Interlaken, Switzerland; the Pink Palace on Corfu, Greece, and the Flying Pig in Amsterdam. The photos on the front pages of their websites ought to clue you in as to how you’ll sleep if you’re hunkered down in one of their bunks.

I know these aren’t the only three; where are the other party hostels?

Photo of the Day (09/17/07)

by Iva Skoch on

Since I just made it back from Crete, I figured I would stick with the theme and pick a photo of Crete for today. This one from Falasarna, by Roman Virdi, particularly struck me.

I loved the variety of these roadside shrines they have everywhere in Crete. They are small, a little bigger than a US-sized mailbox. Some of them look like they have been done professionally, others look built and hand-painted at home. It is their way to commemorate and mourn those who died in car accidents. Judging by how many of these shrines you see in Crete, it is certainly not the safest place to rent a car and explore…

Greetings from Crete: Diving Like It’s 2999

by Iva Skoch on

If Crete is the first place you will ever dive, chances are you won’t ever do it again…unless you like hanging out underwater, some 60 feet deep and in poor visibility, and seeing about ten fish an hour, that is.

If diving here is any indication of the state of fish in the Mediterranean, we should all be very, very scared. There are, for sure, more fish at an average all-inclusive hotel restaurant buffet table than there are in the water off the northern coast of Crete.

To be fair, we did see a few barracuda and a couple fireworms, but that’s about it. Save your Euros for sightseeing and frappe-drinking instead.

Greetings from Crete: What’s Up with the Picture Menus?

by Iva Skoch on

You have to wonder about the intelligence of Crete’s tourists since virtually all the menus are not only in Greek and English, but also in pictures. These things are huge, too, usually taking up an entire entrance to a restaurant. Handy for all those people who prefer seeing a photo of a life-sized lobster before they eat it, I suppose. Or a picture of a Coke or a glass of wine, for that matter.

The worst part of it is that most of the picture menu boards are not professionally photographed; in fact they are faded and make the food look really nasty. Not that there is a particularly good way to make hummus look appetizing in a picture, but still! Seeing food dumbed down to this level in a country with such culinary delights should be illegal, I think.