Mediterranean Iconic Shores Ocean Cruise

Day 12: Monday, November 10, 2025 - Athens, Greece

The day's statistics:
-  Weather: Overcast, then rain. A lot of it. Upper 50s
-  Steps: Linda: 9,391; Steve: 10,308

Today was a little different.
As decribed in the summary, we were taking the "A through E" trip, along with merely 120 fellow passengers. Further, there were about 250 total passengers staying on the ship after Athens (doing A > C or D). Which meant there were about 750 passengers departing us.
What made this further interesting was that we would leave for our excursion this morning, and when we got back - most of the 750 departing passengers would be different.
One "technical issue" with this situation is that the Viking system doesn't exactly support our situation. When we looked at the itinerary on the TV, it showed that we didn't have anything scheduled. But we did. We visited Guest Services for clarification and were told about this "anomoly". I'd like to think Viking could do a better job with this...

Our excursion "Panoramic Athens" departed at 8:15, so we arose at 6:30 in order to make sure we weren't rushed.
After our breakfast at the Workd Café, we made sure we were heading out on time to be on the bus by 8:10.
Today's guide was Yota, and our driver was Andreas (I think he was the same driver from yesterday).
For at least part of the ride, we took the same route as yesterday.
We passed the Onasis Research Center, which was created after the elder Onasis lost his son, a rooftop garden, some more ruins, and some government buildings.






















The bus eventually dropped us off in a parking lot in the shadow of the Acropolis wherein we started a walk down a cobblestone road and into town.
At the beginning of our foot tour, we took a selfie.

And then we continued on.











After the stroll and history lesson about Greece and Athens, we stopped at one end of a short market street.
Yota told us that we had about a half-hour of free time - until 11:00 - to be at the other end (one block away) of the market street. Some travelers chose to stay in town - including going up to the Acropolis - and making their own way back to the ship. We did a little shopping and headed to the other end of the street. We stopped at the fist booth to acquire our shot glass and postcard.

It was less than four Euro, and we paid with a five and received one Euro and some smaller coins as change. But why that matters is because on the bus we were told that the owl Euro is actually rare. Coincidentally, we actually received an owl Euro as change.

While we were waiting, it just started to rain a very little. So little that we were on a bench under a tree and weren't getting wet. We did get a little wet as we headed to the bus that picked us up at the other end of the block.
After those that were returning to the ship - most of us - boarded, we headed back. The skies srarted getting ominous.
These images are not altered.


Not far from the port, the skies really opened up. It was pouring. It was so bad that most of the pictures were not clear because the phone camera focused on the water on the window rather than outside so the cars making thier own wake while driving wasn't visible. The unfortunate cars were parked on the side of the road.


When we finally arrived at the drop-off area, we had to wait a couple minutes and then a spot under the covering became available and we were able to park in a spot where we wouldn't have to be exposed to the elements.
We walked through the terminal, passed through security, and made our way onto the ship - only having to go outside again for a very little bit.
We were treated to a small portion of hot cocoa when we got back on the ship.
We made our way to the Living Room bar to see if we could get more cocoa. Patrick told us they didn't have any. So we settled for some coffee. While we sipped our coffee, we struck up a coversation with John - a new passenger since Athens - who happened to be sitting at the bar near us. Some how we got onto the subject of games, and I told him about our Games subdomain (still in progress as of this writing), and told him I could send him the QA code when I phone was cooperating.

After returning to our cabin and dropping our excursion items, we headed to the World Café for lunch.
Linda had the half-sandwich (the first thing on the buffet), and some side salad.
I had a little bit of the other items, including the jerk chicken skewer, and a slice of the proscutto pizza.
For dessert, Linda had one of the little fruit tarts, and I had a slice of the chocoate cake and a parfeit.
I toured the buffet and took a few pictures of the various items - and not even all of them - from the buffet.

After our lunch, we headed to the lounge for some Dominion (the card game).

There was another Viking ship - the Vela - moored near our ship.


It was a relaxing afternoon, and we even walked a couple laps after the storm passed.
About 5:30 we were already in the atrium awaiting dinner. The ladies were playing again and we enjoyed a couple songs before we headed to dinner.

The maître d' was already starting to recognize us, and assigned us to Station 1 - table 53.
At the next table over say Sandy and Steve from Chicago that we talked to quite a bit.
We reviewed the menu.

Linda had the Destination Menu of Soupa Fakes (not pictured), Feta Crusted Lamb, and Kadayif.


I had a double order of Tiger Prawns, Feta Crusted Lamb, and Warm Ramekin Cookie.



As we were departing the dining room, there was a group of three former Marines - one wounded (or suffering from an ailment) - that were singing the "Marines' Hymn" (the one that starts "From the halls of Montezuma...")

While we hanging out in the lounge, a bit before 8:30, the ship left port.

I eventually got around to sending John the QA code for the website.

We eventually made our way back to our cabin, relaxed a bit, washed up, and went to bed.

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