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April 26- Ancient Olympia
This was the other of our long-distance road trips—it ended up taking almost four hours to get there, because the mountain roads were even longer and twistier than the ones to Delphi. So it was nearly 1 PM when we got there. We did a pretty quick run through the museum, and then had about an hour to explore the site, which was barely enough time. The main areas of interest were the temples of Zeus and Hera (this is the only site containing temples to both of them), the stadium (one arch of the vaulted tunnel to the stadium survives), and ruins of treasuries, living quarters, and training areas. We made a point to note the spot between the Temple of Hera and the spring house, where the Olympic flame is rekindled for each Games (this was done two weeks after we were there, on May 10, see photo).
There is a bunch of mythology connected to Olympia as well—it is a contender both for the site where Zeus imprisoned his father (the hill next to the site is called Mt. Kronos), and where Tantalus served his son Pelops to the gods as a meal (both the subsequent resurrection of Pelops, and the idea of the young son overthrowing the old father are supposedly recalled in the periodic celebrations of youthful athleticism of the Games).
We got a late lunch right in town, despite the fact that everything there looked rather touristy (we had set out to find another book recommendation outside of town, but had no luck finding it). Oddly enough, I had one of the best meals of the week there—a mixed mince kabob served on pita with a sweet-spiced tomato sauce and yogurt sauce.
Another long ride back home: Bob wasn't feeling well so Rob drove their car back and I drove ours. I should mention here that I absolutely loved driving in Greece. As with Italy, we had heard dire warnings about the lawlessness and general stressfulness about driving there. I have come to realize that once you've spent some years in the DC area, everyone else's driving nightmares are overrated. First of all, I like the cars: they are all punky little manual transmission deals, not particularly powerful but with fairly zippy handling. The other thing that's great is that while drivers are aggressive, they are also attentive and polite. No one will sit in the left lane and go slow because they either don't notice you or don't care. No one speeds up when you try to pass -- most of the time they will slow down and move partly onto the shoulder, which, combined with the narrowness of the cars, makes ignoring the double yellow line a much more reasonable prospect than at home. And it was good to know that driving a stick really is like riding a bicycle—you get back into it even if it's been a few years.
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