Felt good enough to try and go out and explore our immediate surroundings a bit, so after a slow morning, we finally pulled ourselves together and went out for coffee (at least). Dope is still closed with no understanding of why it’s closed or if it will reopen while we’re here, so we “settled” for Tailor Made (which I think is actually closer). Two coffees, a croissant, and a bougatsa later, and we were camped on their terrace looking to see what else was around we could check out.
(A bougatsa is like a phyllo pastry puff, stuffed with a cheese similar to what’s inside a cheese danish. A little sweet, made sweeter by the pistachio cream and powdered sugar I had them put on mine.)
The pastries didn’t fill us up, though, so we ended up back around Irini Square and grabbed tacos at Ancho. I’m not anti-Greek food, far from it, but this is one of the things that we looked forward to about spending a long weekend in Athens last year (a wider variety of international options) and I’m not gonna be sad about tacos, Asian noodles, or Italian pasta in my fast food options.
We eventually decided to wander down towards Syntagma Square, not for any specific tourist purpose, but just to walk some of the streets and see what we encountered. (H was looking for a notebook for work stuff, and I desperately need a haircut.) Found a department store with a mini Apple store inside (but not a notebook worthy of H’s needs) and, after spinning through the edge of Syntagma, a fun deli and grocery that H had seen on Instagram, which we poked around in a bit. H got a tote bag to add to her growing collection.
Still feeling willing to be outside, we kept strolling, parallel to Ermou and then behind the main part of the Monastiraki flea market, and eventually along the edge of the the Roman Agora and Hadrian’s Library before heading to one of our absolute favorites from last year, Diodos, for some wine and mezes that would likely pass for our dinner.
Greeks eat like most Europeans — a big (longer) meal at lunch later in the afternoon, and then a small meal for dinner starting somewhere around 9. We were a bit earlier than that, and we weren’t starving, so some small plates for sharing — tzatziki, potato salad, some fried meatballs — and (more importantly) a carafe of the house wine, which turned into a second as the night wore on. We’re definitely not one-carafe people any more, and sitting with a view of the Acropolis, who wants to rush home?
We shared some baklava and the waiter brought out some oenomelo again and that’s a nice treat. We had told ourselves that this was going to be our usual Sunday night haunt, that we were going to make sure we took advantage of the city whenever we could, so even a little under the weather, I’m glad we kept to our promise and I’m looking forward to every Sunday night now for a while.