Fighting jet lag

It's really kind of amazing that even when you are on a bus you see this enormous ancient structures among the modern buildings.

Even though my body was begging me for rest, I decided to wash my face, change in to shorts and sandals, and walk around just to explore. It was about 5pm when I finallly organized myself and walked out the door. I was originally going to try to visit Acropolis but after asking a lady at the bus stop how to get there, she told me it was wayyyy too far, like an hour walking. She pointed me in the right direction, and off I was too see the stadium that was supposedly a 20 minute walk. (I ended up walking like three hours and at least one of them was me just being lost so in hindsight I could/should have just gone...

I don't think I have ever been this inept directionally in a city, and this is not the first time I have traveled to a city with a different alphabet! Most of the street signs are in Greek and then in the latin (?) alphabet. The streets of Athens are like spaghetti and are intersected my millions of other streets and people seem to park anywhere remotely close to the sidewalk. Plus, the roads are STEEP! Like I was leaning forward to walk up some of these. Felt like I was on a stair-master.....

I finally did find the stadium, but of course the wrong side.... There seemed to be some kind of trail that surrounded the stadium, a lot of people were running and walking around it SO I figured if I just followed the walls of the stadium I would get to the front of it, right? WRONG. I ended up walking down a super steep staircase and there was a locked fence.... Okay back up these stairs...

Hmmmm maybe if I go around on this side trail I will find an exit. Again, WRONG. I did get to an opening where I could see Acropolis and some of the city but AGAIN the gate was locked.... So close yet so far. Okay let's turn around and try this trail... Nope this is a circular running path and I now have seen these same two guys pass me like 4 times and i swear they are laughing as I huff and puff up these ridiculously steep hills.

I finally realize that this is a park with one entrance, so basically I walked 45 minutes up and down hills and ended up where I started.... Lolz.

Finally found the correct way and the front of the stadium! 

From there I followed signs for the center with hopes to find the plaza that the bus had left me at. I ended up spotting Olympian right as the sun was setting and it was truly breath taking. I only had 15 minutes to admire since the site was closing but just LOOK at these.

I continued on and made it to the Greek Parliament kind of on accident and there were several people standing around so I figured it was a tour group. I approached because I love mooching tours. People were actually standing around for the changing of guards so I walked up right at the perfect time. 

Across the parliament building was the square I had been looking for- success! I love squares- they really come to life in the late afternoon/early evening. 

As I was people watching and trying to figure out my next move, this guy comes with a speaker system and starts dancing with a few other people and then this other guy that seemed completely irrelevant with a soccer ball was juggling t the beat of the music. I was CONVINCED that I was about to witness a flash mob because like 5 other people joined in. I was slightly disappointed when they announced themselves as street performers and of course put out the hats.

It was actually really cool though because they started with traditional Greek dancing! And from there went on to really intense break dancing with flips and hand stands and all kinds of other things.

By now its like 845 and I am just now realizing I hadn't eaten anything for over 12 hours so I should probably do something about that. (at least if I keep this up, I won't come back fat like I did the last time I was in Europe 😛) I did NOT get lost on the way back to the hostel amazingly, found a little gyro corner shop, and continued with my #diningallaroundtheworld ! I don't think I will ever have a 24 hour period where I eat "typical" food from 3 different cities/countries!

Took the coldest shower of mah lyf because the hostel charged a euro for hot water, but as my first shower in 36 hours, it was amazinggggg.

People at hostels can be the WORST though. I was out by like 10pm and then some other people (I was sharing a 6 bed) came in at midnight and were the loudest thing ever. It sounded like they were all wearing steel toed boots and were just knocking things over and rustling all in sight. Chances are they were drunk (this morning I saw they were all in normal clothes and had grimey ass feet- gross). I was seconds away of telling them to shut the fuck up but I figured if they were already so inconsiderate, me saying anything wouldn't make a difference. I was quiet as a mouse when I got up this morning at 7am to make my trip to Delphi anyways because I am a respectable backpacker,  just FYI :)