Welcome to the Aegean Sea.

First stop the island of Aegina. It is an island right off the coast of Athens. At night you can see the sprawling lights across the water twinkle up the hillside like a Christmas tree in October. Really a perfectly charming island with a bustling mix of restaurants and shops along the port. Boats are docked there with fresh vegetable stands spilling out onto the sidewalks as they set up their impromptu fruit stands. We shop for fresh ripe tomatoes plucked right from the vine and oversized watermelons that have to be eaten right away because they barely squeeze into our scaled down refrigerator.

The highlight of our stay was a visit from my sister and her husband. They have been enjoying a whirlwind trip through Europe and were finishing up in Athens. In the morning they took a ferry over to join us on a sightseeing excursion of the island. We had a little lunch on the boat and then rented a car to check out the historic ruins on Aegina. The best preserved is the temple of Aphaia. You have to marvel at the tall fluted columns and substantial pediments supporting this once grand temple. It is a feat of early engineering and craftsmanship. While time and weather has long since take away its polished surface, and knocked down a substantial part of its façade, the grandeur is not lost on us. In the late afternoon, the two of them caught the last ferry back to Athens. While the Acropolis and national museum should not be missed if you are in this area, the dirty and polluted city of Athens does not really seem that inviting to us. Since we have seen its historic treasures before, we decide to not stop there this trip through. Instead we head to the sun washed and whitewashed islands of the Cyclades.