Napflion, March 21: "Kylie put that cat down you are allergic!"

   Wednesday morning we woke up early and met in the square to get on our first coach bus of the trip. This little tugboat drove us all over the mainland (well, only to Napflion, but it felt much longer!). For some reason our group of 20 people have child-size bladders and literally need to eat every 2 hours. So you can imagine what our bus rides are like, with a few people getting car sick, a few complaining because they are hungry, another couple who are always needing a bathroom, and then occasionally a few who even do some daytime drinking (no mom, not me). We first stopped at the Corinth Canal that was man-made and some people actually bungee jump off this thing.

Corinth Canal

Then we made our way to our first on-site class at the Mycenean citadel in Tiryns. This was actually pretty cool because we were finally able to see the stuff we spent 2 months of class talking about; and even reminded me a bit of the ruins I saw in Peru. I took tons of pictures and can definitely say I made the best decision to study abroad.

At Tiryns

   We left Tiryns early afternoon and headed to the city of Napflion (like a Saugatuck, MI vacation spot?) where we grabbed lunch and then headed up to a Venetian fortress at the top of the city. Of course as I was getting out of the bus I fell and am now the proud owner of a bruise on my hip that's the size of a grapefruit. Even though I am in a completely different continent my luck hasn't changed much. Anyway we made our way into the fortress and were released like children at recess to explore. It was seriously breathtaking to look out over the city and just see rows and rows of houses and then the Aegean Sea stretched to the horizon.

   A couple hours later we descended the hill, chose our "pension" (similar to a hostel), had a little gelato (again, Carlisle, you were blown out of the water), and relaxed on our rooftop patio that overlooked the city. Sounds pretty incredible right? Well, I cannot forget to mention that our pension sat at the top of the hill (basically the next level below the fortress), and to come/go from it, we had to master about 140 steps every time. Other than the constant cardio, it was still pretty amazing. So most of us headed out that evening for dinner (Greek Salad, Greek Pizza, and Ouzo) and eventually a bit of night drinking. I learned two things that night: Kylie is deathly allergic to cats and climbing stairs sober and drunk are equally as hard :D

Our "pension" (ruins behind it, standing on our rooftop patio)