Athens Walking Tours
There are plenty of Athens walking tours but we've come across a company, Alternative Athens, that offers walks with a difference as well as other Athens experiences that try to show you the real city - and its people.
Athens Street Art
Some of the options on offer have us longing for our next trip to Athens, so we can sample one or two of them. How to choose, though, from options like cookery lessons, ceramic workshops, the chance to dine with a family in their own home, or take walks that look at unusual aspects of the city, like its street art, or a walk through the non-touristy areas of Athens.
Our Pick of the Athens Guides
Ceramics Workshops
Instead of just buying an Athens souvenir, here's a chance to make one of your own. This experience sounds fascinating, and takes place in a real ceramics workshop where they make those replicas of ancient Greek artifacts that you see in museum shops. They're authentic because they use the same techniques the ancient Greeks used, and over the course of three hours you'll get to make - and keep, of course - three or four pieces of work. They're not all ceramics, as you can also choose to make jewelry, beads, and toys like animal figurines.
Cookery Lessons and Dine with a Family
Alternative Athens can organise cookery lessons and arrange for one of the best dining experiences you could have in Athens - dining in a home with an Athenian family. It can be lunch or dinner, Monday to Friday, although weekends can also be arranged with a little notice. You will need at least four people for this Athens experience, and you'll get a 4-course meal with wine and coffee, the ingredients being bought from local producers and at farmers markets.
More Athens Street Art
Athens Walking Tours
Alternative Athens offers several Athens walking tours. One revolves around food and takes you to specialist food stores, to the amazing Central Market in Athens, and with plenty of chance to sample everything from souvlaki to pastries and sweets.
Another walking tour of Athens concentrates on its recent boom in street art, which has really taken off in the last three years as the economic crisis in Greece has worsened. The only shopping tour in Athens will take you to ten amazing Athenian shops, while the Alternative Athens City Walk will show you the fascinating parts of the city that most tourists never discover.
Athens Walking Tours: TripAdvisor Reviews
Alternative Athens must be doing something right as in just a few months they've become one of the top things to do in Athens, according to TripAdvisor.
Further Details
Alternative Athens was founded by Tina Kyriakis, an Athenian herself who wants to show that Greece is more than ouzo, bouzouki, and souvlaki. The company is also happy to help with advice on travel throughout Greece and the islands, and can arrange transfers from Athens Airport and the ports.
Don't miss this visual tour of Athens with photos by Donna Dailey of Greece Travel Secrets.
Other Athens pages
Greece Travel Secrets gives its choice of the best hotels in Athens from budget and moderate options through to 5-star luxury choices.
Athens Airport hotels include the luxury Sofitel at the terminals, Holiday Inn near the airport, and others close by like the Hotel Pantheon.
This drive around Attica offers visitors high hills, beach resorts, small villages and classical sites like Marathon and the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion.
Athens is a top vacation destination. The Greece Travel Secrets Athens guide has information on hotels, museums, Athens airport and all the best things to do.
This beginner's guide to Greek architecture explains how to tell your Ionic from your Doric columns, and what to look for in temples and Byzantine churches.
There are lots of flights from Athens to Santorini as well as a ferry service from Piraeus, with flights to Santorini leaving from Athens International Airport.
The beach resorts of Athens are easily reached from the city and also close are Cape Sounion with the Temple of Poseidon, ancient Marathon and Rafina's port.
If you're wondering where to eat in Athens and Piraeus we have a few suggestions including some favorites around the Acropolis, Omonia Square, and Syntagma.
The Pnyx hill near the Acropolis is one of Athens' true hidden gems, a place to wander freely away from the crowds and discover ancient places and mysteries.
Ten Fun Things to Do in Athens include eating in the Central Market, watching the sun set over the Acropolis and seeing one of the world's oldest theatres.
Greece Travel Secrets lists the ten best museums in Athens, with the top two being the National Archaeological Museum and the Acropolis Museum.
Syntagma Square or Constitution Square is the main square in Athens and has a metro station, the Greek Parliament building, hotels, cafes, and a post office.
Piraeus is the port of Athens from where many ferries to the Greek islands depart, and it also has an Archaeological Museum and the Hellenic Maritime Museum.
Pictures of Athens from the Greece Travel Secrets website
The National Archaeological Museum is one of the best things to see in Athens, and the best museum in the world for seeing Greece's archaeological treasures.
In My Athens on Greece Travel Secrets travel writer Mike Gerrard describes what he loves about Athens including the Acropolis and eating!
Mount Lykabettos is the highest hill in Athens and provides some of the best views of the city, with a funicular cable car the easiest way to get to the top.
Greece Travel Secrets visits the Monastiraki Flea Market, followed by Sunday lunch at Sigalas on Monastiraki Square
Around Monastiraki is the flea market, Athens cathedral, Kerameikos Cemetery, the Benaki Museum of Islamic Art and the Psirri and Gazi nightlife districts.
A History of Athens from the first people to live on the Acropolis through the Golden Age of Pericles and Alexander the Great to the military junta.
There's all kinds of entertainment in Athens whether you're interested in theatre, dance, classical music, jazz, Greek music, rock music, disco, opera or movies.
Easter in Athens is, like everywhere in Greece, the biggest religious celebration of the year and this page tells you what to expect over the Easter weekend.
The Changing of the Guard in Athens takes place outside the Parliament building at the top of Syntagma Square and is a must-see for visitors.
The best views in Athens include views from the Acropolis and of the Acropolis from the top of some of the city’s several hills and from hotels and restaurants.
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