Greek Adventures Vacation Journal! Day 1/2 - outgoing travel

So, we returned a couple weeks ago from a whirlwind amazing trip to Greece.  We documented with a TON of pictures, and I kinda just want to re-process everything we saw!  We looked at so much historical ancient amazing important things, which I know very very little about.

I'm just going to do a vacation journal, and research things more as I go thru it.

Warning:  Tons of Pictures and Rambling coming ahead.  Stop reading now if you find that completely uninteresting!!

(photo credit: Chris)

 This was when we were still perky excited energetic travelers after just one flight to Dallas.

(photo credit: Chris)

A short visit to the USO in Dallas (the 1st time).  Name patches on the USO wall.  Also Hello to Gary Sinese-On-The-Wall!  Fun things on the walls.  And weird sculptures in the terminal.

After a significant delay, and then sitting on the tarmac for 2 hours, I was beyond grumpy to not be in the air to London yet.

(photo credit: Chris)

(photo credit: Chris)

(photo credit: Chris)

Finally made it to London!!!  After the 4.5 hour delay in Dallas, and then only having a planned 5 hour layover in London, we RAN across the airport to find that they had given OUR seats away because we hadn't checked in.  WHAT?!??!?  But thank goodness they had two seats available, pending that we didn't have any luggage to check.  The airline counter worker got on her cell phone to her supervisor to get special permission to let us board with only our carry-on luggage.  Yay!  One point for carry on luggage!

 I love tea.  Chamomile to calm my tension after running through the London Heathrow.

 The BEST airline meal I've ever had!!  Aegean Airlines = good job.  This was only the beginning of amazing Greek food.  I was doing sparkle-fingers while eating.  Claudia, the greek woman sitting next to me that we later befriended, I'm sure thought I was crazy.

Claudia, after asking where we were from, told us about her experience in an international ambassadors trip/internship with Governor Bill Graves in Topeka!  She was currently flying home so she could vote in the European election.  I don't understand European politics, but this was evidently a very important election that was going to affect the future Greek election.  They are not too pleased with the Greek Prime Minister (who happened to be on Brent & Julia's flight to Crete a couple days ago!) and are eager to get rid of him.  (sounds familiar)    They do voting on Sundays, so that people can go home to vote, because they don't do absentee ballots....?  At this point, I was too tired to hang on to much information.  But she was super nice, and excited about all the places we were going to visit on our trip.

No pictures taken upon arriving in Athens.  We were personally collected by a Greek airline worker (and anyone else traveling to Crete) upon disembarking from the plane and whisked away thru winding hallways and check points.  This man was FAST.  He didn't wait around.  He just walked and expected all of us little ducklings to follow him.  These Greeks are efficient.  I like it.  And before we knew it, we were on our 50 minute plane ride to Crete.  Brent and Julia picked us up and drove to Agios Nikolaus (we flew into Heraklion) while exchanging stories of our travel adventures thus far.  (Brent & Julia arrived a few days before we did.)

(photo credit: Chris)

FINALLY!!!! We made it to a bed in Agios Nikolaus!!!!!  WOOT!!!!!
Up and at 'em tomorrow morning for Greek Adventures!