The Panathenaic Stadium

This morning I decided I needed to go sightseeing, and I hadn't been inside the stadium yet.
The stadium was first used in 330/329 BC for athletic games. In 117-138 AD they changed the shape from rectilinear to horseshoe and installed rows of spectator seats made from marble. Due to the prevailing of Christianity the types of celebrations and spectacles taking place here were abandoned. In 1896 they chose to hold the first modern Olympic Games there and reconstructed the stadium entirely out of marble. The Olympics as we know them today were held here in 2004, and the Athens Marathon finishes here each year(see prior post on the marathon).

Statue across the road from the stadium

The seating capacity is around 68,000 spectators.

Mt Lycabettus casually hanging out in the background.

 The weight of the marble is 85,100 metric tons.

The total number of steps to the top is 107.

The seats directly in the middle of the stadium (the 50 yard line mark if it was football).

The Royal boxes after 1908.

The Acropolis sneaking a little peek here.

A bit of a zoom.

  

These drinking fountains were throughout the stadium.

Two sided Herm.

One of the sides.

I wanted a picture of these blocks and hung around like a creeper for about 5 minutes, but these men just kept rotating places for new photo ops while wearing medals and holding up a coffee mug like a trophy/torch/IDon'tReallyKnow. Needless to say I just took the picture with them standing on it.

Inscribed stelai

I saw a cat on top of this hole on the track. Then he climbed in and disappeared.

 

The vaulted passage.

I thought this was the coolest part of the whole stadium (since it was cold and the sun was warming me up outside). This passage is approximately 70 meters in length.

As I was walking back down the passage thinking about how much I enjoyed it, I hear a man talking to small children(some sort of track and field day going on) and then sudden "oohs", "ahhs", and amazed exclamations. I couldn't help but think me too kids. Me too.

At the end of the tunnel was a small museum. Here are some recreated torches used from various Olympic games.

The altar from where the High Priestess lights the Olympic Flame for its journey to the city that organizes the games.

A replica of the concave mirror which concentrates the sun to light the torch.

 

Behind the highest seats of the stadium is this track that is open to all. I probably saw about 30 people running or exercising on poles and such here. One man was even using a tree for kick boxing.

I went along this dirt track path to find a couple things mentioned in the brochure. Pictured above is the site of the Tomb of Herodes Atticus.

And this may or may not be the site of the temple of Tyche/Fortuna. It looked like a hole in the ground to me, but I didn't see anything else in this area, so I'm going to go with it.