The Costa Deliziosa spent only 6 hours in the Piraeus (port of Athens), so there was no time for dallying. We woke up at 6:20am to prepare for today’s journey to Athens. Our ship started letting people off the ship at 8:15am and we were among the first in line. Unfortunately, we missed the 8:05 X80 bus to the acropolis, but so we caught the full-to-the-brim 8:40 bus. We quickly walked to the acropolis to try to beat the crowds.

Rick Steves calls the acropolis the greatest site of the ancient western world. It’s pretty neat and the ruins are well maintained, but it was much smaller than we expected. It is possible to walk from one end to the other in just a couple minutes (if you aren’t blocked by a tour group).

After touring the acropolis, we walked to the ancient agora (included in the acropolis ticket). As we were walking through, it started raining, so we cut our tour short and headed to the nearby metro station to return to the port. In the port area, we picked up a couple of Greek savory puff pastries to eat on our journey back to the ship. We made it back with about half an hour to spare before all-aboard time.