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2024-04-30 01:01
in Greece2024, Ntrips
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After being ahead in Nafplio (1 day instead of 2), I realized that it was possible to add a long day trip to Olympia, so I did the drive there after finishing Mycenae. It was a somewhat painful 3H+ drive there from Nafplio and a bit longer back to Athens. It is true that by today's standards, it looks small and underwhelming, but it was still very much worth seeing. Thankfully it was just late enough in the season that the sightseeing times had moved from 15:30 to 20:00, making the side trip feasible and worthwhile.
The museum of the olympic games, was a good place to start and the archeological museum was next:
lots of things found in excavations
This is what the original amphitheatre that was used for over 1000 years, looked like. Yes, it's small and underwhelming compared to Roman theatres ;)
of course the area had fancy buildings which are now mostly gone
The archeological tour, showed what was left. Nothing much, if anything, had been restored
The tour ends with the arch to the main arena:
it looks quite flat
I went to compete for the original 2000+ years old olympics
It would have been nice if more had been restored, but even as is, it's a nice and peaceful area:
Before driving out, a quick stop in town to visit the very good Archimedes museum, showing all the excellent work he did, arguably one of the top geniuses of the world until Leonardo de Vinci, up to 1500 years later. He was sadly and mistakenly killed by a roman soldier. What a loss...
After leaving Mycenae around 11:00, arriving at Olympia around 14:00, the tour visit was mostly over 3H later, and with a 3.5H drive to Athens to return the rental car in time by 21:00:
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