Athens
The Acropolis has been a fortress, a temple, a church, a mosque and an ammunition store, and the modern city sprawls around its rock in concrete apartment blocks with rooftops that all face it. Climb Philopappou rather than the Acropolis for the first view, go into the new museum before the ruins, and eat late in Exarcheia or Koukaki, where Athens is loudly itself.
Why go
The Acropolis — a fifth-century BC statement of what a city could be, still on its rock. A museum built for one building — the Acropolis Museum shows the marbles at the same orientation and light. Neighbourhood life — Exarcheia, Koukaki and Pangrati, where Athens is loud, argumentative and cheap. A base for the islands — Piraeus puts half the Aegean within a morning.
The character
Athens is not an ancient city with a modern one around it: it is a modern city of four million with an ancient acropolis in the middle, and the proportion matters. The classical city was small; the modern one was built in a hurry after 1922, when a million and a half refugees arrived from Asia Minor, and again in the 1950s and 60s, when the polykatoikia apartment block — concrete frame, marble facing, balconies — was replicated across the basin by the tens of thousands.
That is why Athens looks the way it does, and why visitors who expect a picturesque capital are surprised. The pleasure here is not in the streetscape but in what happens on it: the tavernas, the arguing, the cats, the rooftops on which the whole city eats in summer, and the Acropolis appearing at the end of an ordinary street. The 2004 Olympics gave the city a metro and a pedestrianised archaeological promenade; the financial crisis after 2009 hollowed out and then, oddly, energised the centre. Athens rewards a second visit far more than a first.
Places of character
Acropolis Museum — the Parthenon gallery is glazed and oriented exactly as the temple is, with the gaps where the Elgin marbles should be. Philopappou Hill — the best view of the Acropolis, free, with pines and a Roman monument at the top. Ancient Agora — where the democracy actually met; quieter and more informative than the rock above. Anafiotika — a village of Cycladic houses built into the Acropolis slope by island masons in the 1840s. Varvakios market — meat, fish and spice halls in the centre, with two tavernas inside that never close. A Pangrati or Koukaki rooftop — the modern city's real institution, best at nine in the evening.
The way to do it
Climb Philopappou first for the view, then the Acropolis at opening, then the museum in that order — the site makes sense after the hill and before the marbles. Eat late, at nine or ten. Take the metro, which is excellent and has antiquities in the stations. And go up to a rooftop at least once: the whole city's summer social life happens above street level.
One perfect day
Philopappou at seven for the Acropolis in low light and no company. Down and up the rock itself at opening, an hour among the columns. The Acropolis Museum next, ending on the glass Parthenon floor. Coffee and a slow lunch in Koukaki. Afternoon in the Ancient Agora, then the Benaki or the Cycladic Art museum out of the heat. Ouzo and mezedes in Varvakios market at six, dinner at nine in Pangrati, and a rooftop drink afterwards with the Parthenon lit above the rooflines.
Grand hotels
Hotel Grande Bretagne — 1874 on Syntagma Square, headquarters to three occupying armies and every Greek political crisis since. King George — next door, from 1930, with a rooftop suite that has a private pool facing the Acropolis.
When to go
Best expression: April to early June — warm, clear, and the archaeological sites bearable all day. Consider: October and November, when the light is best and the city returns from the islands. Avoid if possible: July and August, when the heat regularly passes forty degrees and Athenians leave.
The frame
Ideal stay 3 nights · Minimum 2 nights · Best arrival by air, then the metro in forty minutes · Airport ATH, 33 km · Walkability good in the centre, hot and hilly · Best without a car yes