Athens

Truly this was a land of legend and history.  All about us the phantoms of ages past crowded into the present.  Athens...another city or paradox, crowned our Aegean adventure.  We crowded shore into waiting busses to go to Athens, Golden City of a Golden Age.  It was no disappointment.  the magic was not gone.   You felt as if you were in another age when you ascended the steps to the Acropolis.  Dazzling beyond our poor powers to describe, it was alive as nothing inanimate you had ever seen could be. Even in its present state of partial ruin as a result of venetial cannonade setting off a Turkish powder magazine in 1697, it is still greatness personified.

The Great Gateway - The Porpylea - through which ran the sacred way to the Parthenon; the Erechtheum in which statues of Greek maidens act as supporting columns to the roof of the enclosed porch; the miniature Temple of Victory, reconstructed in the 19th century, a glittering gem; all classical Greek at its best - about 450 B.C.  in the Golden Age of Pericles.

                    They aren't the same as today's beauties                        Proof we were there
                             but they held their own

                                                                 They may have worn skirts, but you
                                                                    didn't challenge their manhood

Port of Call - Gaeta Formia