Athens

How our visiting time in the Netherlands and Germany was over.

We left Eindhoven very early and arrived at 9:00 am at Amsterdam airport, I had always checked in, but I didn’t have the boarding pass, as I needed to present the vaccine and PCR test documents.
When we arrived at KLM there was a huge queue, more than 100 people, it took almost 2 hours to get the boarding pass and then we thought it would be ok, as we wouldn’t have to do customs. It was a mistake.
The line to undergo the X-ray will be much longer than what we had picked up at check-in.
I walked a little better, but we stayed for more than 45 minutes and the stress only increased, as the boarding time approached.
After we pass through comes the marathon because the terminals are immense. We arrived at the gate at the exact moment of boarding.

It took almost 4 hours to board.

A little history of Greece

Historians point out that the human presence in the Athens region dates back, more or less, to the period of 5000 BC.
The name comes from the Greek goddess Athena, it is a city located in the south of the Greek territory. The soil is not very fertile for food, but it is very good for the cultivation of olive trees and grapes, which is still a significant part of Greek cuisine, which has characteristics of Mediterranean islands.
Formerly, the Port of Piraeus, which is one of the largest ports in the Mediterranean, boosted maritime trade, enabling the expansion of the Athenian domain in the 8th century BC.

The city grew up was largely due to its strategic location for maritime trade. The enrichment of merchants in the region increased the political and economic power of Athens.

Athens went through several wars and conflicts. In the fifth century BC they faced the Persians in the Medical Wars. The Persians were defeated and Athens came out strengthened and with prestige in the region.

From that point onwards, the city was considered the most important city in Greece. In 431 BC it faced Sparta in the Peloponnesian War, a conflict that was recorded and described by Thucyddes in “The History of the Peloponnesian War”.

The city can be considered as a cultural center that radiates aesthetics, philosophy and art to the ancient world. Important philosophers of the period were Athenians, like Socrates.

Athens was, therefore, an artistic, economic, intellectual and cultural center of ancient Greece. Its strategic position and political centralization led to prestige and recognition in the region.

Weakened by the Peloponnesian war, but even so, its forms of government, social organization, artistic and cultural expression spread throughout the western world.

Athens

From the plane, you can see that it is a dry place, with a lot of rocks and a blue sea.
As I had made the documents via the internet, we just had to present them and leave quietly, everything very quickly, as we are already in Europe and I didn’t even need to do customs.
Then the equality with Europe ended, our driver was late, after waiting about 20 minutes we went towards Athens and soon there was traffic, very similar to São Paulo.
The first sight of the Acropolis is stunning, everything that is known about the history of Greece passes through your mind.

We are located in the Koukaki district, it is very close to the main attractions, you can do everything on foot, but it also has easy access to the subway.

Each day we would visit some of the main attractions.
Especially the Acropolis, as we are very close, we arrived right at the opening time and we were able to visit the place with almost no people after 10 am it is simply a tumult.
As we were leaving, the first excursions were arriving.