Athens Bus

The Pink Palace runs their own bus to and from Athens since that the usual next stop when travelling through Greece. It turns out that the Eurail pass isn't valid for half of the ferry ride from Italy to Greece... and the ferry arrives in Patra without enough time to catch the last train to Athens, forcing tourists to spend a night in Patra also. The combined cost of that and the ferry is more than the Athens bus (but not by much).

Actually, the bus turned out to be an interesting (albeit uncomfortable) ride. A girl (who has a boyfriend) I had met at the toga party was also taking it along with three guys from Florida who we had met on the ferry ride to The Pink Palace. I conveniently had the seat right next to hers ;-). But almost immediately one of the guys from Florida sat down next to her (the bus was empty enough for everyone to have their own two seats). So I had front row seats to listening to this guy try to successfully hit on her. Unfortunately, he didn't say anything worth repeating on here. He was that ordinary. I had a sly smile on my face the whole time he was talking, which she noticed and exchanged knowing glances from time to time with me. I almost burst out laughing when the guys in the seats behind her and behind me tried to jump into the conversation too. It was pretty funny to watch. During one of our ferry changes, I had the chance to tell her that I was impressed she was so willing to be nice rather than give the bitchy attitude that would generally save a girl in her position a lot of time and energy (I worded it differently than that, don't worry). The guy came back after that (mistake number 30ish), knowing that this was the time everyone was going to sleep, and started spouting off all these excuses about why he couldn't sleep elsewhere. I felt bad for her (I probably could have stepped up and helped her out at that point). But I had my own uncomfortable double seat. So I did my best to try and sleep. I don't think I did much better than her.

We made it to Athens in the morning, and I think she caught a flight home the next day. Too bad I didn't get any contact info from her, she seemed worthy of keeping in touch with. Oh well...