the roof, the roof, the roof is on fire

The past few days have been incredibly exhausting. Thursday night, the guys in the other group had a barbeque and invited everyone over. They grilled out on the roof of their building-it was really cool, they have an amazing view of the Acropolis and the weather was perfect. We ended up staying until midnight, even though we all had to be up incredibly early the next morning for our excursion. I ended up getting sick from something, and was nauseous the entire weekend which really put a damper on the trip because it was the only time of my whole stay in Athens that I didn't have to pay for my food. We left at 8 on Friday morning on a charter bus and drove to Delphi where we toured the ruins and visited the museum. It was really amazing to see everything there, the ruins were really cool and the information was interesting. We made the mistake of hiking up the mountainside to see the stadium there-it took forever and was a very strenuous climb, but the stadium was neat, they had carved stone seats around one side and entrances for all the competitors. After touring ancient Delphi, we went to lunch in the modern day town; the food was really good, but I was too sick to really enjoy it. The restaurant we ate at was really cool, it was located near a cliff that overlooked a valley of 1 million olive trees and we spent about half an hour standing on the outcropping because the view was incredible. We got back on the bus and drove for several hours to Olympia where we were spending the night. Our hotel was amazing, it has only been open for a year and it was gorgeous. Sarah and I got a double room so we really enjoyed that, we ate dinner on the patio by the pool and then went to bed early. Saturday morning, we got up early and toured ancient Olympia. That site was really neat because it has so much on it. It took us about 2 hours to see everything and then we went and toured the museum, which was interesting as well. After the museum, we had an hour of free time to walk around the town and do some shopping. I found a really neat ring with the symbol of Greece interlocking around the band and then bought the paperback edition of The DaVinci Code so I would have something to read on the bus. Lunch was really good, and the restaurant was really neat that time as well, the owners also run the hotel we stayed at. After lunch we got back on the bus and spent about 6 hours driving to the coast. Our driver took a wrong turn so we ended up on the scenic mountain road instead of the main highway; I have never been so car sick in my entire life. The view was incredible but in the end not worth the extra time. We stopped for a break in a small mountainside town Lagadia, where we were nearly run off the side of the cliff by a garbage truck that was trying to get past us. It was quite stressful, so it was nice to get off the bus for awhile. I found mom's birthday present and walked around with the others while they shopped. We finally made it to Tolo, where we were spending the night on the sea side but I was too sick to get in the water. We walked on the beach for awhile and then watched BBC for about an hour because the World News was the only thing in English. Sunday morning we got up early again and drove about half an hour to Epidavros, the site of the best preserved open air theatre in Greece. We are going back on the 8th of July to see a performance of Euripides's Bachae, which will be really neat because the theatre was amazing. We toured the ancient ruins of the sanctuary of Asklepios, which was the "most brilliant centre of healing in the ancient world." We drove from Epidavros to Mycenae, which was probably my favorite stop of the trip. We toured the museum and then climbed the acropolis; it was the most amazing thing I have ever seen in my life. Mycenae was the stronghold of Agamemnon, and the ruins were incredible, I could have stood on top of that mountain forever. After climbing down, we drove over to the Tomb of Agamemnon, which was basically a big underground room. It had never been buried, which explains why the entire site had been looted. After hearing about the history of the tomb and its creation, we dropped the Geneseo group in town and went to eat lunch at this really gorgeous restaurant on the outskirts of modern day Mycenae. Lunch was delicious-I got a cheese omelet and then we shared a fruit plate for desert. It was the only meal I ate all weekend that didn't make me sick, which is why it was my favorite. We picked everyone back up an hour later and drove another hour or so to the Corinth Canal. I really wanted to explore ancient Corinth, but unfortunately that was not on our agenda. The canal was really neat though, some of the group wants to go back for bungee jumping. After resting for awhile, we got back on the bus and drove back to Athens, which only took about an hour; I slept the entire way and came back to the apartment and got in bed, which is basically where I have been since then. I got up for about 2 hours yesterday to get groceries and then went back to sleep. I slept until 4 this afternoon and just got out of the shower. The group is going to climb Lykavitos hill tonight so I'm hoping that I feel better because the view is supposed to be amazing at sunset. Hopefully I'll have my pictures up on webshots sometime soon, it's going to take forever because I took a ton of them. This weekend we're going to Santorini for four days, which will be really fun: we get to swim in the Caldera. I'll write more later. ~Rachel