Downtown Thessaloniki

Yas as! (This means hello in Greek)

Looks a lot like CyRide at school

This trip took me back to my first days on Iowa State's campus due to being in a totally new place that I'm not quite sure how to navigate yet. So the first thing on the to-do list was to figure out the bus system so that we could go to the city and near by towns if needed. Luckily for us, we had a tour guide from the school, Thanos, to help us figure it out the first time. He also gave us a tour of the city.

*Fun fact: The name Thanos is a very common name here as well as Nikos and Kostas.

After we made it downtown, we began the tour. Here are pictures I took a long the way.

This is the Arch of Galerius and was made in the 4th century A.D.

This is one side of carvings on the Arch.

These ruins were accidentally uncovered when the city was trying to building an underground parking ramp. This specific site use to be a market way back when.

This picture was taken within the previous picture. At the end of this tunnel was a museum filled with artifacts found on the site.

These are peices of pottery and jewelry that were recovered.

An outdoor theater.

Of course we had to take a group pic on the stage! These are the other students that are in the same program as I am this summer. Between all of us, there are 4 research projects and some are taking Greek Wine and Business. I absolutely love this group already and they are going so much fun to be with for the 6 weeks. Sooo in the back row from left to right, we have Remy from Florida University, David from the University of Chicago Urbana-Champaign, Abby from Appalachian State University,Cody from the University of Chicago Urbana-Champaign and Savannah from Arizona State University. Then on the bottom from the left to the right is Marlie from Cornell University, Zella from Berea University, Kat from Arizona State University, Rae from the University of Akron, Liz from Iowa State, Liv from Virginia Tech and Jennifer from the University of Chicago Urbana-Champaign. :)

#CylconeNation

On our way out of the ruins site, we saw a room that was more than likely used as a sauna.

On the way to the white tower...

Still headed to the White tower...

And finally, the White Tower. It use to be a fort that also served as a prison, but is now a museum today.

We went up for a while....

UNTIL we reached the top. This view was worth every step!

A view from the other side.

We signed their guest book on the way out.

I call this one "FETA" cuz I'm cheesin' :)

Lastly, we checked out Aristotle square to grab some coffee before heading home. Greeks LOVE coffee, so much so, that most coffee shops deliver. However, this square is made up of restraurants, shops and lots of taxis.