Car was delivered to the hotel at 8.30 for our drive to Nafplion. Basically like driving the shit box but worse because we didn’t know this one’s history! The guy told us it was easy to get out of Athens - ‘turn left, then left, then right - follow the signs to Lamia and then take the Korinth exit’….. he was right! Managed to get out of Athens after a one hour traffic jam and also got on a road to Corinth - whether it was the right one is a moot point - we made it to the toll road eventually. Crossed over the canal before we realised, so missed our photo opportunity.
When we saw the signs for Mycenae we decided to detour - so glad we did - Graham was enthused by the Lion’s Gate (almost wet himself!!) and the thought that the history we were looking at was 3000 years old - must say I was impressed, too…. Fired up the GPS but the lady wanted to take us down dirt roads or roads that went into paddocks, so we didn’t pay much attention to her in the end…. She became our ’joke’ as we navigated our way around the Peloponnesus with just the maps from the Thrifty car guy. She did help us out once to confirm we were headed in the right direction, but that was another day……
Seems so big up this close - but not so big when it is compared to the mountains around it.
The entrance to the tomb of Thalos
A replica of the golden mask of Argamemnon
The famous Lion's Gate - and yet more school children to get in the way!
The circle graves
The hills we were to get used to over the next three days.... on the map it seemed so straightforward...
Nafplion is a beautiful town - it was the first capital of modern day Greece, when it first became independent. Took us a little while to find the hotel - lots of little streets that you can’t drive up.. When we did find it, we found a lovely room with high ceilings and shutters, with a balcony.
Had dinner down by the harbour and the waiter told us about the Venetian history - it did remind us very much of Italy, even though we didn’t get to Venice. Lovely buildings, with bougainvilleas growing across the road - very pretty.
It was called the castle of Bourtzi, in the middle of the harbour
Down by the harbour
The harbour, with the Palamidi castle in the background - we walked up there the following day!
Beautiful bougainvillea hung between the buildings in every street in the 'old town'
It was a walking town - large squares and outdoor eating a feature
The view from our balcony - a glimpse of water
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