Tuesday, May 5, 2009

wrappin' it up


Amazingly enough, our time in Greece is drawing to a close this week. The last few weeks of India I could do nothing but daydream about strolling down cow-free streets, spending hours inside museums and gorging myself on salads day and night.

Obviously, my foot injury kept me from doing too much strolling or museum hopping during the weekdays in Greece. But, our weekends were amazing and completely worth the torture of walking around on the swollen, painful watermelon attached to the bottom of my right leg.

Our first sets of visitors came this round and for the first time in over 100 days we put our arms around people we love and who love us.

This trip allowed us to do and see so much...we rode a horrible miniature train in Nafplio, shouted in the center of the ancient theatre of Epidaurus, climbed the tortuous climb to the stadium at ancient Delphi, drove along the gorgeous Greek coastline to the temple of Poseidon, explored 500 year old monasteries atop isolated cliffs in Meteora, drank raki-como after raki-como in the ski village of Arahova, marveled at the complexity of the Colosseum's underbelly, threw a coin in Trevi Fountain to insure our return, ate dinner in the shadow of the Roman Pantheon, swam through the masses at the Vatican, took illegal photos of the Sistine Chapel, sat on the Spanish Steps, had coffee in a living medieval city on Rhodes, climbed up 292 steps to the top of the Arc de Triomphe, stood in the Parisian rain waiting to get inside the Musee d' Orsay, held hands while sitting on a bench beneath the Eiffel Tower, saw the tombs of Voltaire and Marie Currie at the Paris Pantheon, sat and listened to the organ play at Notre Dame, watched the Eiffel Tower sparkle like at jewel at night, laid in the Cretan sun, sat with mouths agape at the intense passion of flamenco, ate paella in the Plaza Major, bought a painting from an artist outside the Prado, enjoyed tapas at a sidewalk cafe, drank sangria in the Spanish sun, debated the level of insanity standing in front of Dali paintings, experienced the joy of Spanish hot chocolate and churros after midnight...and more, more, and so much more.

Just a few days left in this chapter but, in the same breath we bid Greece and Europe farewell we greet our next continent, our next country and our next set of adventures hello.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I was wondering where you ship all of the bigger stuff you buy? It must be weird to buy something, like the painting, and then have to send it away and not see it again for two years. It will be like Christmas morning when you guys return to the states and get to hang out with all of your souvies! Looking forward to South Africa! - Anne-Marie

MAV said...

we've only bought small paintings thus far and two were not framed so they got rolled up in tube and sent home with our neighbors that came to visit. after india (did you know a sari weighs like 5lbs?!?)i've pretty much limited us to buying only jewelry and items made of at least 75% oxygen. baggage overage ain't cheap.