Leisure Pursuits In Athens:

1. SIGHTSEEING TRAIN:

Athens is an amazingly beautiful city, almost every corner of which is interesting for tourists. There are many attractions, and all of them are worth visiting. But if you are traveling with small children who are not yet up for long walking tours, or you have little time to explore the city, we recommend that you see the beauty of Athens from the window of a sightseeing train. There are three colors of trains running around Athens – red, green and white.

The first of them is called the “Happy Train” and goes through the historical center of the city. Its route goes past the Acropolis, Plaka, the Temple of Zeus, Monastiraki Square, Zappeion, Panathenaic Stadium, Odeon of Herodes Atticus, Hadrian’s Arch, the New Acropolis Museum and other beautiful historical places. The trip lasts about an hour, and during it you can simply look at the city around you, but you can also listen to the guide’s story (it is conducted in English and Greek).

During the excursion, the train stops for 10-15 minutes at Constitution Square, Monastiraki Square and opposite the New Acropolis Museum, and with a ticket you can get off at any of the stops to see what attracts you, and then take the next excursion train within two hours. In addition, all these stops are located next to metro stations, and if necessary, you can change your tourist plans at any time. The white and green trains are called the Sunshine Express. They have two different routes. One of them, the Silver Ring, goes through the old city, moving towards Plaka, past the Russian and Anglican churches, the Byron monument, the Byzantine church of St. Catherine, Hadrian’s Arch, the statue of the famous Greek general Makrigiannis, going around the Acropolis hill and the Parthenon, past the Theatre of Herodes Atticus, the Areopagus, the Pnyx Hill, the Ancient Agora, Monastiraki Square, the Roman Market. The duration of this tour is about 40 minutes.

The second one – “The Golden Age Tour” – is the longest in terms of route and duration: it is designed for 1 hour and 40 minutes. The tour includes the entire “Silver Ring”, and also goes past Constitution Square, where you can watch the changing of the guard near the Parliament building, past the Presidential Palace, the monument to Georgios Karaiskakis, the Zappeion. This tour operates only from October to April and, as a rule, is only organized for organized groups. Tickets for the “Happy Train” and the “Sun Express” can be bought directly at the departure point.

2. WAR MUSEUM IN ATHENS:

The history of many countries is unthinkable without the history of wars. Greece, as an ancient state, has fought many times over the thousands of years of its existence, losing and winning, defending its independence, accumulating combat experience and improving its weapons. The Athens War Museum, opened in 1974, houses an extensive collection of weapons and military equipment – from ancient times to the present day. If you have boys growing up, we recommend that you definitely visit this museum with them.

Any boy will be taken aback by the sight of modern fighters – and they are the first thing visitors to the museum see, even before entering the building. On the site in front of the War Museum, there is an exhibition of flight and artillery equipment used by different armies in the wars of the 20th century. The museum exposition is divided into 10 halls, each of which is dedicated to a separate period in the history of Greece and significant events in the struggle of the Greek people for independence.

The story begins with the history of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations. Moving from hall to hall, visitors get acquainted with the reign of Alexander the Great and the Byzantine period, with the life of the Duchy of Athens, created by the Crusaders at the beginning of the 13th century, with the history of the war for independence and the creation of the new Greek state, leaf through the pages of the history of the Balkan wars, the Greco-Italian and the Second World War. Comparing the clumsy weapons of ancient people with masterfully forged swords, and then with modern firearms, it is easy to follow how the weapons of soldiers change, becoming more perfect and sophisticated. In addition to a rich collection of various types of weapons, the museum presents beautiful models of Greek fortresses, as well as ancient warships and the specific weapons used on them.

For example, one of the display cases presents a unique flamethrower for launching “Greek fire” – a combustible mixture invented by the Byzantines specifically for naval combat. The paintings of battles are also very impressive – for example, a panorama depicting a scene of an air ram. The panorama reproduces the battle over Thessaloniki that took place in November 1940, when Lieutenant Mitralexis of the Greek Air Force rammed an Italian bomber in mid-air. The museum is also rightfully proud of the collection of P. Saroglos, who for many years collected rare examples of weapons from different eras. Many of them are real works of art. Among other things, weapons used during the Greek Revolution are presented here. The luxurious decoration of the hall where the collection is exhibited emphasizes its value and uniqueness. In addition, the War Museum contains many maps and lithographs illustrating the rich history of Greece.

3. NEW ACROPOLIS MUSEUM:

When planning a program of excursions with children in Athens, be sure to include a visit to the New Acropolis Museum, which is located just 280 meters from the main attraction of the city. A visit to this unusual museum, built using the latest technology, will give a lot of vivid impressions to all members of the family. The area of ​​the building is 23,000 square meters, of which 14,000 square meters are occupied by exhibits located on three main levels.

An interesting fact is that the museum was erected on the site of archaeological excavations. Thanks to the glass floors on the ground floor, you can even see some of the excavations yourself. On the first level of the museum, finds made on the slopes of the Acropolis are exhibited. Then visitors enter the Hall of exhibits of the archaic period (from the 7th century BC to 480-479 BC). There are many sculptures on display here that you can walk around and examine from all sides. A separate hall displays exhibits from the temples of Athena Nike, the Erechtheion and the Propylaea. The Parthenon Hall is one of the most interesting exhibits, where originals and copies of the sculptural decoration of the pearl of the Acropolis are on display.

Children will especially remember a visit to the New Acropolis Museum, since viewing the exhibits usually turns into an exciting adventure for them, during which they can demonstrate their attentiveness and dexterity. Young visitors to the museum are invited to play an interesting quest game and find twelve different statues of the goddess Athena while examining the exhibits, marking their finds with stickers in a special booklet that comes with a “family backpack”. You can get the backpack at the museum information desk before you start viewing the exhibits. In addition to stickers, the set includes a memory card game with images of the goddess Athena, as well as a set of stickers. After viewing the exhibits, you can buy a souvenir in the shop, and also have a nice time in the cafe or restaurant of the museum with a stunning view of the Acropolis.

5. GOULANDRIS NATURAL MUSEUM:

The Goulandris Museum of Natural History, which is also called the Nature Museum, was opened in 1965 with the aim of popularizing natural sciences and drawing attention to issues of habitat protection. Today, this museum, located in a beautiful building in the suburbs of Athens, is a rich collection of mollusc shells, stuffed fish, insects, reptiles, birds, mammals, a large collection of minerals and fossils, a huge number of plant samples – more than 200 thousand.

It is interesting to come here with children – firstly, because the museum has many bright, unique exhibits, and secondly, because you can’t resist the opportunity to see a real dinosaur skeleton. The seven-meter skeleton of a triceratops – a dinosaur that lived 60 million years ago – is the pearl of the Natural History Museum. But the other exhibits are no less interesting. Many animals and birds are not only depicted in their natural habitat, but also as if they are busy with their usual business: wild boars are digging in the mud, a turtle is going for a walk, a pelican is enjoying its catch, tigers are grinning, lions are going hunting, zebras are running away from pursuit, a snake is basking in the sun.

The exhibition presents many exotic animals – for example, the platypus. The botanical collection is also beautiful. Unlike other herbariums, where dried plants are presented in a flattened, nondescript form, here many plants look like they are alive – they are beautiful and colorful, as if they were recently grown. In addition to land plants, the collection also contains amazing representatives of the underwater flora, as well as imprints of ancient plants on fossils. The insect collection deserves special attention. Beetles, butterflies, grasshoppers – who is not in it. Here you can see those insects that tend to fly away and gallop away when you try to catch them during walks. You can also see the fruits of the labor of these small inhabitants of our planet – for example, honeycombs built by wasps.

In the hydrobiology hall, your eyes will run wild – an incredible number of mollusc shells of all colors, shapes and sizes, as well as lobsters, crayfish, crabs, shrimp and other exotic inhabitants of the seas and oceans are collected here. The paleontology hall is also interesting – it contains the bones of fossil animals that inhabited our planet millions of years ago, fossils on which shoots of prehistoric plants are imprinted. After a tour of the museum, you can have a snack in the cozy Ammonites cafe, decorated with shells of these ancient mollusks.

6. COPA COPANA AQUAPARK:

The Athens water park “Copa Copana” operates all year round, offering active water entertainment and attractions in the summer, and in the winter it turns into a real winter park with snowy slopes for skiers and snowboarders, as well as a large skating rink for ice skating enthusiasts. The summer attractions of the water park in Athens are varied and designed for every taste and age.

Adults can get a boost of positive emotions by going down such slides as “Black Hole”, “Rafting”, “Big Family Slide”, “Turbo Slide”, “Kamikaze”, and then drink a refreshing cocktail on one of the island bars located in the middle of a large pool. Here, on the territory of the park, you can simply sunbathe on the sun loungers by the pools or on the lawn. The water park has a wonderful children’s area in the form of a fairy-tale town on the water. Here, kids can splash around in a pool with a maximum depth of 45 cm, slide down a variety of water slides, and play on a pirate ship moored right next to the fairy-tale houses.

In addition to water activities, the child will visit a playground with colorful trampolines, labyrinths, houses, and slides. You can have a snack in one of the cozy indoor cafes or bars. There is a shop on the territory of the water park where you can buy any goods for beach and water recreation.

7. ATTICA ZOOLOGICAL PARK (ATHENS ZOO)

Attica Zoological Park opened in 2000 as a Bird Park, offering visitors the third largest collection of birds in the world. It immediately gained immense popularity among young visitors and their parents. In the following years, the park developed by leaps and bounds, adding more and more new sections: in 2001, the “Reptile World” opened, in 2002 – “Greek Fauna”, in 2003 – “African Savannah”, a section of monkeys and big cats – wild animals of the cat family.

Later, in 2004 and 2005, “African Savannah” expanded its borders to include “Monkey Forest”, “Cheetah World”, and in 2008, the zoo became richer with another section – “Desert Dwellers”. But the zoo does not stop there: the nearest plans include the opening of the “Dinosaur City” and “Oceanopolis”. In total, about 2000 animals (350 species of fauna) live in almost natural conditions on 20 hectares. In this corner of nature, it is simply pleasant to wander along the beautifully landscaped paths surrounded by trees, lawns and small ponds and, what is important, very friendly inhabitants of the zoological complex.

The zoo is a member of EAZA (European Association of Zoos and Aquariums), which means that all standards and rules for animal care, hygiene and nutrition, information support required by the association are observed here. An interactive educational program is held for visitors of the zoo on a regular basis, raising awareness of visitors about the importance of nature conservation. The programs are divided into several sessions and topics depending on the age of the listeners. For the little guests of the Athens Zoo, there is a children’s playground, a cafeteria, a picnic area and a souvenir shop.