Athens Olympic
Stadium
The Greece Travel Secrets guide to the original Athens Olympic Stadium,
built for the 1896 Olympic Games and open to the public for jogging and
photography.
The Athens Olympic Stadium
For sheer, simple grace, the beauty of this stone athletics
stadium, within sight of the equally graceful Acropolis, is hard to beat.
This stadium, also called just Stadio, was built in 1896 when the Olympic Games were revived and fittingly held in their original home country. Many Greeks were disappointed at not being awarded the 1996 Olympics to celebrate the centenary of the stadium, though they did of course return to Athens in 2004.
The Athens Olympic Stadium or Panathenaic Stadium
The 1896 stadium is also known as the Panathenaic Stadium, named after the original stadium where contests were held on this site from the 4th century BC onwards. The Olympic stadium follows the same plan as the ancient stadium, which was described by the geographer Pausanias in the 2nd century AD.
Architect Ernst Ziller, responsible for many fine late 19th-century Athenian buildings, was commissioned to design the stadium in the spirit of its predecessor.
Our Pick of the Athens Guides
Visiting the Athens Olympic Stadium
A visit to the stadium won't take long as there is little to see other than the structure as a whole, but you may find some Athenians jogging round the track, and visitors can wander around the centre and look at the statues marking starting and finishing points.
Photographers will also be tempted by the sweeping curves and repetitive lines of the 47 rows of seats, which hold up to 60,000 spectators. The seating is on three sides only, leaving the fourth open with views across to one of the few wooded areas in central Athens, a corner of the National Gardens.
A few other Athens pages
This Athens dining guide doesn't list restaurants but gives practical advice on types of eating places, tipping, hotel breakfasts and picnics.
Greekality is a Greek company offering food tours in Athens including street food tours, wine and nightlife tours, vegan tours and cooking classes.
Athens' Benaki Museum is one of the city’s top museums with an outstanding collection, especially of Greek and Egyptian artefacts, in a beautiful mansion.
If you're wondering where to eat in Athens and Piraeus we have a few suggestions including some favorites around the Acropolis, Omonia Square, and Syntagma.
Piraeus is the port of Athens from where many ferries to the Greek islands depart, and it also has an Archaeological Museum and the Hellenic Maritime Museum.
Athens is a top vacation destination. The Greece Travel Secrets Athens guide has information on hotels, museums, Athens airport and all the best things to do.
The Athens National Historical Museum is in the former Greek Parliament building and houses an archive of historical artefacts and documents.
The best things to do in Athens, Greece, include top archaeological sites like the Acropolis and must-see attractions such as the National Archaeological Museum
Amusing children in Athens is easy as there is lots to do including a children’s museum, planetarium, beaches, and easy excursions to the nearest islands.
Two of the best cocktail bars in Athens, MoMix Kerameikos and The Clumsies, are making creative cocktails using that most Greek of Greek spirits, Metaxa.
The Greece Travel Secrets website looks at the Athens weather, the chance of rain, the climate in summer and winter and the best time to visit Athens.
The Changing of the Guard in Athens takes place outside the Parliament building at the top of Syntagma Square and is a must-see for visitors.
The Athens War Museum is a fascinating look at Greek history through the lens of warfare from ancient battles to the Greek War of Independence and World War II.
The Athens Byzantine and Christian Museum is housed in a beautiful villa with an underground wing and lovely gardens too.
Athens Airport hotels include the luxury Sofitel at the terminals, Holiday Inn near the airport, and others close by like the Hotel Pantheon.
If visiting Athens it helps to know when major events and public holidays take place, as some shops and attractions may be closed, but to be there at times like Easter can make for a magical trip.
This drive around Attica offers visitors high hills, beach resorts, small villages and classical sites like Marathon and the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion.
There are lots of flights from Athens to Santorini as well as a ferry service from Piraeus, with flights to Santorini leaving from Athens International Airport.
This walk around the Kolonaki neighbourhood of Athens starts and ends in Syntagma Square and takes you to several museums, Kolonaki Square and Mount Lykabettos.
The Athens Museum of Cycladic Art houses a remarkable collection of Cycladic figurines and other items and is one of the best museums in Athens.
Ten Fun Things to Do in Athens include eating in the Central Market, watching the sun set over the Acropolis and seeing one of the world's oldest theatres.
Around Monastiraki is the flea market, Athens cathedral, Kerameikos Cemetery, the Benaki Museum of Islamic Art and the Psirri and Gazi nightlife districts.
Greece Travel Secrets lists the ten best museums in Athens, with the top two being the National Archaeological Museum and the Acropolis Museum.
Athens culinary tours are among the food walking tours offered by an unusual company, Culinary Backstreets.
The Athens Acropolis has the city's most iconic building, the Parthenon, along with other historic buildings and is where the Elgin Marbles were taken from.
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