It was decided the evening before that some of the group, now known as the Ancient Architectural Greek Enthusiast Appreciation Society (AAGEAS) wanted to visit the Parthenon, the other part of the group (now known as the stones and rubble party - SARP) couldn't be bothered as we'd seen it every day from the breakfast balcony.

The groups consisted of:

AAGEAS - Simon Stanton, Simon Barrand, John, Ian, Shaun, Keith and Shannon.

SARP - Shane, Paul Derrick, Tony, Andy, Jackie, Rose, Gary, Lola, Diane and Paul Leadley.

So 2 different breakfast times were had by the group, the AAGEAS on the early sitting and the SARP on the later one. The AAGEAS set off to see the sight, whilst the SARP sat and enjoyed the sunshine.

AAGEAS - They got up to the Acropolis site for about 8.45am. Declined the offer from a very nice lady who was trying to sell them a "private tour" for only 40 Euro. Shannon queued for about two minutes for the tickets and walked straight in.

Spent a couple of hours wandering around the site, taking photos, laughing a lot.

Keith took his top off to allow the locals to enjoy the splendour of his body, but one of the staff asked him to put his top back on, something about being disrespectful.

Managed to press gang a number of tourists into taking pictures of them, and Simon B and John managed to get themselves into a number of other peoples' photos.

Final picture was Shannon standing on one of the rocks doing her Rocky impression - but we'd finished before anyone could tell her to get down.

By the time the excursion was over it was so busy there was a queue to get out, and probably 1+ hour's queue to get in.

The AAEGAS went back to Tony's bar for a coffee, and decided to stay there for a burger-and-beer lunch, wandered back into the cafe/restaurant area and through the streets of souvenir and nik-nak shops. Stopped for a fruit smoothie, then wandered more (and more, and more.)

Finally got back to the hotel via the mini-market.

SARP - A gentle saunter to the Plaka resulting in Shane finding a quaint alleyway that we had not discovered on our previous jaunts, it just so happened that at the top of the quaint alleyway was an even quainter little taverna, be rude to walk passed it without experiencing their hospitality.

We ordered 6 beers, to be joined by Paul and Tony, so that's now 8 beers and then to be joined again by Diane and Paul Leadley - 10 beers!!

By now it was lunchtime and a group decision was made to have a bite to eat here.

The AAGEAS had also finished their trip and Keith decided to ring Lola to ask where we were. Shane said that he would never find us as we had found the taverna by accident ourselves and suggested that we all meet in Tony's bar at 4o'clock. Lola said "no someone speak to him and explain where we are" Shane said no they wouldn't find us. Lola asked again if someone would speak to Keith, Lola passed the phone to Jackie and Jackie said hello, goodbye. She pressed on the cancel button not realising that it needed to be swiped to cut off the call. Rose then also said Hello, goodbye and swiped the button. A look of shock passed over Lola's face and she said that was very rude to which Rose and Jackie laughed. She then turned to Paul Derrick and repeated that it was very rude, Paul nodded his head and said yes. Diane's response to Lola was to point to the Blue and White flag flapping in the wind and saying" this is where we are".

After lunch had a little walk up the hill, which Tony and Paul had already discovered and posed for a group photograph amongst the flora and forna and a few old bricks. The pathways were slippy on the way down and it was Lola's turn to do a Zorba impression, skidding gracefully over the well worn Grecian paving slabs. No one laughed - MUCH.

An ice cream was called for and so we made our way back to the ice cream parlour choosing not to be greedy and only having 1 scoop on this occasion. Sitting in the square to enjoy said ice creams, Jackie with a big smirk on her face, and out of the blue said "Does anyone have a spare gi that they can lend Rose so she could train tonight" A look of horror and shock on Rose's face appeared. Diane volunteered her clean gi but said that she didn't have a white belt - sigh of relief from Rose until Gary stated he had on she could borrow. Looks like Rose is training after all. Rose informed Jackie that she was no longer her bestest friend and she didn't like her anymore. Being Jackie she just laughed.

A gentle walk back to the hotel to meet the other party was on the agenda, however, this is when Jackie decided to show us how good she was a break dancing, Paul Derrick stepped aside so she had plenty of room for the moves, whilst Rose and Lola halted in their tracks, doubled in two laughing hysterically. Needless to say that once Jackie had composes herself from the dance show and Rose & Lola from nearly wetting themselves, we continued on our gentle walk as previously mentioned on the agenda back to the hotel.

A few hours rest by all before the night's training, except Rose who was still in disbelief of Jackie's outburst. She did come round to the idea and agreed that Jackie was still her best friend.

All met outside the hotel at 6.30 in gi bottoms and corporate polo shirts ready for our training session.

Everyone was in a jolly and relaxed mood this evening.

On the way to the Dojo, John turned the steep corner down the hill and ended up doing a perfect Bambi on ice impression, told you the pavements slabs were slippy.

An excellent evening's training, warm welcome and immense greetings from Sensei Panos Agrios and his students. The evening was finished by celebrating Panos's birthday with choruses of Happy Birthday sung in Greek and English, followed by cake being shared by the entire group. Photos were taken after training in the dojo of our group and the new

Quick change (and we do mean quick) at the hotel then back out to carry on the celebrations with our new found Greek Aikidoka friends. A very enjoyable last group evening with plenty of drinks, laughs and photos involved.