A loud car alarm woke me up at 7:30. I tried to sleep a little more, but a hostel mate kept ranting to his friend about how we so drunk that he got lost inside his own hostel. So I got up and dressed at 8:00 AM and began my day.

Breakfast was simple and meager, a few small slices of bread and fruit juice. after shaving and flossing my teeth (could not bring toothpaste on the plane), I headed off on my walk of history.

The first stop was Hadrian’s library. The nice thing about touring the ruins on Sunday is that all the monument and museum entrances were free. I walked around Hadrian’s Library for a little while and moved onto the Roman Agora. The Roman Agora was Athens center of commerce and trade during the reign of the Roman Empire. Looking how much little of what previously was downtown remained it made think what Wall Street would look like two thousand years from now and if tourists would go visit the ruins of the NYSE. The Roman Agora stood at the base of the Acropolis hill, so I began my ascent up to the Parthenon.

Areas surrounding the Acropolis are littered with preserved history. My first detour was visiting a Byzantine/Ottoman public bath that was now preserved as a museum. This museum was rather dull, so I walked through it quickly. As I climbed further up the hill, I made a wrong term and headed to a dead end in a residential area. While at the dead end I saw a mountain higher than the Acropolis in the city limits. It had  what looked like a church on the top and a large flag and would have made a good climb if I had time.

I turned around and ran into the Ancient Agora. I was given a large bottle when I sick yesterday, but I did not drink very much of it so I kept it for my current hike. However, it grew annoying lugging around when I was not thirsty and when taking pictures. So, I dropped off my water bottle at the entrance of the Agora and explored the area. The Ancient Agora was the downtown of the Athens in the classical Greek era. However, other than roads, all that is left is rubble. The only freestanding buildings that remained were an old hilltop temple, a Byzantine church build one thousand years later (600 AD), and a newly built museum featuring a variety of Greek artifacts. I walked around the park that where the origin of democracy took place and viewed the old Greek pots, coins, and statues that were held in the adjacent museum.

Heading back to the entrance, I picked up my untouched water bottle and ventured onward. At the base of the Acropolis plateau stood a solid stone hill known as Aeropagus hill. This was a great site to get a picture of the Acropolis and also a historical site where Saint Paul converted the first Greeks to Christianity.

I climbed down the hill and finally reached the Acropolis plateau. The first site there was a large amphitheater known as Herod’s theater. I then walked up the steps through the temple of Athena-Nike. After that I reached a Parthenon. It was significantly larger than expected and was an impressive sculpture. However, the fact that it heavily supported and covered with modern scaffolding took away from its luster. I then walked down the steps to see another minor temple in the area.  A large Greek flag pole stood nobly on the north edge of the plateau as well. I then decided to sit at a ledge on the wall of the plateau and relax. I thought about the legacy of the Greeks and Parthenon as a stark reminder of mortality and the fact there will be a time in the world when I die like the ancient Greeks. While Rome is the eternal city, Athens is a like a funeral ground for the Greek civilization. I then hiked down the east side of the Acropolis and saw some more structures and visited the theater of Dionysus. The funny thing is the seats at the 2,500 year old amphitheater are more comfortable than lecture halls of Bocconi.