I returned from Mykonos in the early afternoon on the 14th and made my way to my hotel on the Metro. My new hotel was better than the last, and also cheaper, but located in a bit sketchier area. After settling in a bit I walked to the nearby National Archaeology Museum. I arrived at about 5:00, which gave me three hours in the museum before it closed. This was definitely not enough time, so I spent most of my time in the Minoan, Mycenaean, and sculpture collections and raced through the rest, planning to return another time. I left when the staff started turning the lights off.
The next day I planned to go to Corinth, which was a rather complicated journey. I began by taking a bus from a stop just outside my hotel to the bus station. At the station I bought a ticket for another bus to Corinth. I waited about 40 minutes and boarded that bus, which took about an hour to get me to the center of Corinth. The driver dropped me off in the middle of town, and I had no idea where to go from there. I finally went into a hotel to ask directions, and the desk clerk told me how to get to the bus station. I arrived at the station a little after 10 and the woman at the ticket booth told me that the next bus for ancient Corinth would arrive at 11. I waited until a bus arrived and she told me to get on it. It turned out that this was not actually the bus to ancient Corinth, but the route intersected with that of the ancient Corinth bus, so the driver dropped me off there for no charge. I finally bought a ticket and got on the proper bus. This bus took about half an hour to get to the site. I made the mistake of listening to some fellow Americans who said they knew what they were doing and got off the bus too soon, so I had to walk for a kilometer or so to get to the site. I met them again at the ticket booth–they had hitched a ride from a local rather than walking. That is something one cannot really do while traveling alone, especially as a female. Finally, four hours after I left the hotel, I was at ancient Corinth. The site is smaller than I expected, but interesting nonetheless. It is dominated by the archaic temple of Apollo, which looms over the ancient agora, lined with shops. I was hoping to see some of the residential quarter, which would have been useful for my research, but these areas were inaccessible. Instead, I took notes on the architecture of the agora. I also visited the little museum on site to see some of the finds from the site.
The visit as a whole took less time than I thought it would, partially due to the oppressive heat, and after a few hours I took the bus to the modern city. On the way back, the bus stopped. It turned out that a car was approaching from the opposite direction and the road was not wide enough for both vehicles. The bus driver yelled at the car driver for a little while. Then the bus driver got out of the bus and the driver and passengers got out of the car. Words were exchanged for a while, along with some gestures. The bus driver got back in the bus and nothing happened. He got out again, there was more yelling and gesticulating, and eventually the car backed up and let the bus pass. It was hilarious. The woman next to me on the bus was very embarrassed that I would come away with a bad impression of Greek culture, but I assured her that this was not the case.
The bus schedules were more favorable for my return, and it took me only about three hours to get back to Athens.
there & back again 
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