The Parliament, the Evzones changing guard on the hour, and the old royal garden behind — a tropical 16-hectare lung in the centre, free and open dawn to dusk.
Syntagma (Constitution Square) is the front door of the modern Greek state. The 1840s royal palace on the eastern side became the Parliament in 1934; the square below was the place where every constitutional moment of the country has been declared, demanded, or fought over.
The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on the Parliament wall is guarded twenty-four hours by the Evzones — soldiers in the 19th-century Greek mountain costume (the foustanella kilt with 400 pleats, one for each year of Ottoman rule; the tsarouchi shoes with woollen pompoms). The hourly changing of the guard is a slow-motion choreography that takes seven minutes; come at 11:00 on Sunday for the full ceremonial parade with band and full company. Behind the Parliament, the National Garden is Queen Amalia’s 1840s royal garden — sixteen hectares, fifteen thousand trees, ducks, peacocks, a small zoo, a botanical museum, the most peaceful walk in the centre. Cross south through the garden and you arrive at the Zappeion (1888 exhibition hall, the modern Olympics’ first venue) and the Panathenaic Stadium (the 1896 marble re-build of the 4th-century-BC Athenian stadium, where the modern Olympics opened). Three civic monuments in a half-hour walk.
A civic Athens half-day.
The 1939 Athenian institution on Voukourestiou two minutes from the square — Greek breakfast, slow start.
The full ceremonial parade with band — seven minutes of slow-march. Be there 10:30 for a front spot.
Vasilissis Sofias gate down the central avenue, the duck pond, the Zappeion. Forty-five minutes.
Five-minute walk south-east; €5 in, an audio guide, a lap on the cinder. Forty minutes.
Pre-booked window seat at the Grande Bretagne's roof — head-on Acropolis view, two-hour Greek-modern lunch. €70 per head.
Fifteen-minute walk north-east — the 4,000-year sweep of Greek decorative art, in a converted Ionic-style mansion. Two hours.
Walk back to the square at sunset; the Parliament façade goes pink against the western sky; the 19:00 hourly guard is the quiet weekday version.
On foot, within ten minutes.
Eight minutes' walk south-west — the old quarter under the rock. Detail on the Plaka page.
Five minutes' walk north-east — the upmarket district below Lycabettus, with the city's best restaurants and gallery scene. Detail on the Lycabettus page.
Twelve minutes' walk south-west via the Areopagitou pedestrian street. Detail on the Acropolis page.
Eight minutes' walk south through the National Garden — the 1896 marble Olympic stadium. Inside the same loop.
Five minutes' walk south-west — fifteen Corinthian columns of the Temple of Olympian Zeus. Same combined ticket as the Acropolis.
Tell us a little about the trip you want — pace, who's coming, how you'd like to spend your mornings. We'll build the days.
