Kiki's Visit

First things first.  I have to write about Kiki's visit!  On Monday the 6th Brian and I drove to Athens to meet Kiki.  It was perfect timing b/c Brian had the next few days off after a great win against Faliro.  It was Brian's first game back after his "injury" and he played great scoring 3 goals.  We took advantage of his short break and grabbed Marco and headed to Athens.  Kiki wasn't arriving until that evening and we got on the road early, initially having planned to stop at Mycenae and maybe Epidavros on the way.  It ended up raining though and we just decided to head straight to Athens early.  As we were maneuvering our way through the crazy traffic packed streets of the city I see a Taxi out of the corner of my eye inching closer and closer to our car.  In my head I thought, "he's going to stop before he hits us," and to Brian I just said...."Brian," but it was too late.  Sure enough, the Taxi DID NOT stop and just plowed right into the corner of our car and kept on driving with a little smile on his face.  We both just kind of sat there, mouths agape, not really believing what just happened.  I jumped out of the car to take a look at the damage and saw another Taxi driver kind of looking at us in disbelief and pointing in the direction of the cab, like, why aren't you going after him?  But what were we to do?  Run the Taxi over and yell at him in English?  So in an empty attempt at revenge I wrote down his license plate and we moved on.  Brian kind of wiped up the scratch later and that was the last of that.  After all, it is just a rental.

When we got to the hotel I went to the counter to check in and was kind of hoping Brian would hide somewhere with Marco so we didn't have to deal with all the attention he draws, and possibly a problem with the staff.  I booked that particular hotel, Divanis Palace Acropolis, for the sole reason that we had read they allowed dogs but knowing the way Greece works, you never know.  Sure enough, once the women saw him sitting there she asked me, is that dog staying with you?  I knew there was going to be a problem.  She said, "we do not allow dogs over 5 kilos (Marco is about 12.5kg).  I gave her the "oh no, I had no idea" puppy dog face and she kindly called her manager and he made an exception.  I honestly don't think they would have made one if Marco wasn't as cute.  They just asked us to make sure he stayed quite, ha, since there were other people on our floor.  This meant we could NEVER leave him in the hotel room alone, so Marco came with us everywhere.

After we picked Kiki up from the airport we dropped her stuff off at the hotel and walked into the old part of town for dinner.  The hotel was very near the Acropolis and as we walked we had it shining above us, an always impressive site.  Just like when Michelle and Nico were visiting there was no one around.  I still don't understand the schedules of the people in Greece but we found a nice quiet restaurant to sit and have a good meal and that was all we needed.  The next day we set out for the island of Hydra.  We got on one of the "Flying Dolphins" and about 1 1/2 hrs. later we landed.   Hydra is a charming small island just off the coast of the mainland.  What makes it so charming is that they do not allow cars and the only way to get around is via donkey.  Kiki was especially excited about this and getting a donkey ride so that was the first thing we looked for when we got off our FD.  My intentions were to take a pic of Kiki with, or maybe even on, a donkey but the minute we paid any attention to the animal his handler came up to me, grabbed my purse, and practically threw me on the animal....so we were off on our donkey ride.  I don't even think those donkeys are meant for rides b/c they contain wood saddle-like boards atop their backs meant to carry luggage to the hotels.  Well these wood boards held Kiki and I regardless of their purpose and Brian and Marco trotted on foot behind us trying to take pictures.  It was fun and I'm glad we did it.  Hydra is small and we saw most of it within the hour but we found a really delicious cafe right by the water where after our fabulous lunch we decided to go to for dinner as well.  We also walked to the Lazaros Koundouriotis Historical Mansion, former home of one of the major players in the Greek Independence struggle.  We saw that, despite the hours it showed in our travel book, it was closed for the afternoon.  We decided to walk around the island some more, took in more of the sights and the scenery, let Marco run and play with another random dog, and then headed back.  After climbing the hill once more to get to the mansion we were anxious to get inside but to true Greek fashion the doors did not open at the proposed hour it said on the wall and we even waited about 20min. past but they never did open so we gave up on our mission.  After our delicious dinner we headed back to Athens and to bed.  On Wed. we went to Vouliagmeni and Glyfada for some shopping while Brian was at practice.  Unfortunately none of the shops would let Marco in so we had to take turns.  Afterwards we hit up all the Athens sites like the Acropolis and the ancient forum, rested a little in the hotel and then went back out to dinner.  On Thurs. morning we dropped Kiki off at the airport (:-() and Brian and I headed back to Patra.  

From now on my blog will be coming from Turkey as I left Greece yesterday to meet my parents in Istanbul!  I will be here for the next two weeks on a Turkish adventure, stay tuned!