Cruisin' VI- Olympia, Greece

*This is a series of posts about our Christmas Cruise to the Mediterranean Sea. If you want to read them all, click on the "Cruise" tag on the right. If you don't care to watch AND read a slide show of "My Family Vacation" feel free to skip these posts. :)*

Luckily we all got to sleep late the morning after the crazy storm. Once we met up with everybody else we learned that everyone had had a bad night, with most of us either sick up just up all night worrying. So we all had leisurely late breakfast (it looked like most people on the ship were doing the same) and waited around for our day trip to Olympia, which didn't start until after lunch.

Approaching Greece. No one told me ships were so windy!

Our excursion was really pretty lame. We paid for "Olympia- Modernity, Myths, and Something Else I Can't Remember." It was a bus ride to the ancient Olympic ruins (suspiciously not on Mount Olympus) which we were led through with a very knowledgeable, English-speaking guide. Our group had at least 60 people and the guide spoke very softly. I finally had to give up on Maggie and Matt and get as close to the guide as I could to hear what she was saying.

Maggie has had a diaper change on ancient ruins and in Mozart's childhood bedroom.

You can sit on the ruins but if you try to stand you will get a whistle blown at you. Don't ask me how I know.

Olympia is the site of the ancient Olympic games, which began in 776 BC and ended in 393 AD. I had to Google that much, so don't ask me the whys or hows because I don' remember that part. The rest of the post is from memory though.

The columns that held up the gymnasium were actually segments of carved rock that were stacked and bound in the middle to keep them from breaking in half if one part of the column cracked. They could replace segments and save themselves a whole column. There were pieces of the columns everywhere and several had been reconstructed to mimic their original state.

The columns in the picture behind us, however, are the only original complete columns left and have been standing there untouched since 700 BC. Wow.

I made us take a lot of "possible Christmas card" pictures

The modern Olympic games started in 1896 in Athens (pictures of that to come in the next post). In 1936 Berlin hosted the Olympics and wanted to do something to commemorate the link between Olympia and Athens, so they came up with the Olympic flame.

(Did you know it is that new?!?!)

The site of the flame lighting is not in a big bowl, like you (and I) probably think. It is in this modest ruin, which used to be the temple of Hera, Zeus' wife.

This temple was used to sacrifice and animal (usually a goat) at every Olympiad in thanks to the gods for all that was done for the mortals.

Today, every two years, a group of women dressed in long white togas comes to the altar and uses the sun's rays and glass to light the Olympic flame. From there the first runner gets it and heads to Athens with it.

This is a pedestal (one of many) that held the statue commemorating a politician who had somehow cheated in the games. It was punishment to have to pay for an extremely expensive statue.

Maggie, goddess of drool

The white marble line the kids are standing on is the original ancient starting line for all the races.

On your marks, get set....

.... go, Maggie, go!

Olympia is a great tourist spot, but that is literally the only thing in the town. We headed back to the port town and got a snack before dinner- lamb gyros, feta cheese, and cappuccino- and watched the sun go down over the harbor.

Lunch time visitor

Back on the ship, we decided to skip dinner for Maggie because she had not had a nap and was way too cranky for a 2 hour sit-down dinner, so we got her ready for bed and I headed up to dinner.

After dinner and the show I came back down to the room to find Maggie screaming so I took her back up to get the only food available at 9:30pm- pizza. She ate a bunch and we came back to the room, where she threw an adorable crib party until 10:30. We were all exhausted by that time so it was an early night.