Today I visited the Panathenaic Stadium, where the first modern Olympiads took place in 1896.
The stadium is majestic. I find it fascinating that centuries ago human beings built such a grand facility. I'm even more surprised that they let tourists just hang out there (for a minor fee). The stadium is 2,500 years old and it's made of marble!
Look at me looking all regal. While I enjoyed pretending that I was launching the world renowned event, I would totally understand not being allowed to sit on such a precious seat.
The stadium is grand.
And visitors can choose to go all the way up in the nosebleed section--although, in an open-air space the name sunburn section would be more befitting--or run a lap around the mythical track (which I pretended to do.) Visitors lined up to take pictures on the podium. And so did I.
The museum part doesn't have much. It's basically a gallery of Olympic torches and posters. And I was glad to see the one from Seoul, the very first Olympiads I saw. (Thanks for waking me up in the middle of the night, Mom. This started a long tradition.)
This is only one of the many things I did in Athens today.
Tomorrow, we're spending one last day in Athens then we're heading to Crete.