On Friday I took a day to to Delphi, which is a UNESCO world heritage site and about three hours northwest of Athens by bus.  It's on Mount Parnassus.

​The first two pictures below are a treasury building and the second is a copy of a marker where the center of the ancient greek world is.  They moved the actual marker into the museum.

I landed in Athens yesterday afternoon and after a long ride to the hotel, just walked around nearby.  I finally got to have an authentic gyro, made with pork, not the processed lamb/beef loaf that they have in the US.  They must have known that I was from the  Pittsburgh area because they put french fries on it too.

​It's cold in Greece, and I needed to buy clothes for Antarctica, so after I updated my blog this morning I went shopping for some winter clothes.  In the afternoon I walked to the Acropolis/Parthenon, which was only about a mile away from my hotel.  They continue to restorate the Parthenon during the winter months so there was some scaffolding set up on one end.

​Theatre of Dionysus...

​I had an early dinner near the Acropolis at Thanasis Kebab, which is supposed to be one of the best kebab places in Athens (according to TripAdvisor).  Then I went back to the hotel and took a nap...

Katrien and Joris had to take a flight back to Belgium a little earlier than the tour ended, so they stayed behind in Victoria Falls and the rest of us started traveling back to Johannesburg.  The last two days were spent traveling (1,200-1,400km in total, I think).
​We spent the night part way in Francistown at a nice camping lodge, where we had our last campfire dinner.  Again we elected not to pitch tents and slept outside on cots. 

​The last day, we got up early and drove 700+ km back to Johannesburg.  We almost completed the trip without a flat tire, but got one on the last day and spent about 45 minutes changing it before getting back on the road.

​We arrived back at the Johannesburg lodge shortly before 7pm and then I said goodbye to the rest of the group and took an Uber back to the Airport hotel. 

After the park, we walked to the Lookout Cafe above the Zambezi River, where Laura and Timo rode a tandem gorge swing.  A few of us had crocodile kebabs for lunch.

​After lunch, I tried to get USD from a few ATMS, but none were working due to some changes in Zimbabwe currency.  They officially use the US Dollar, but are swapping out $2 and $5 for local notes. 

​And, my credit card didn't work at the restaurant we went to, but I think it's because it's a brand-new restaurant.  Fortunately I had enough USD (combined with a few SA Rand) to pay all my bills before leaving Zimbabwe.

Laura, Timo and I left the lodge just before 8 am and walked to the Falls Park, which was about 30 minutes or less.  Our entry fee was included as part of the tour package and although it was the low water season, there were still great views of the falls.

We left the Salt Flats early in the morning, just after sunrise, and headed toward Victoria Falls.  Along the way, Leonard refilled the 900 liter gas tank in the truck for the first time since we left South Africa, so we had a thirty minute break at a truckstop while the truck was being refilled. 

Around lunchtime we arrived in Kasani and took a pontoon boat ride on the Chobe River, which borders Zambia. We had sandwiches on the boat for lunch.  There was an island in the river filled with hippos, buffalo, and antelope.  Although we had seen a few hippos out of water during the day in Moremi, it's unusual.  The guide said that the hippos along the Chobe river have adapted to spend days outside of water because of competition for food with the other animals.

​After lunch we passed through immigration for Zimbabwe and bought single entry visas for US$30.  I finally got to use my old dollars that no other country would take.

​We got to the lodge around 5pm.  This lodge was similar to the one in Johannesburg in that the rooms were inside, like a hotel, versus tents.
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​We had dinner at the lodge but didn't go out until the next day.

We slept in and had breakfast/brunch at 9am.  Half of the group went on a village walk and the other half of us just relaxed at the lodge (first two pictures).  We didn't leave the lodge until about 1:30pm, and drove to the Makgadigadi Salt Pans to spend the night.  We arrived about an hour before dark to a place that Drifters uses called One Tree Island (see picture below). We all decided not to pitch tents and put our cots out on the salt flats instead.

We left Zabuti early, probably a little after 5:30am, and drove back to Maun, seeing more animals along the way (I think the photo of the ostrich with twelve chicks may have been from the day before).  We got to Maun around lunchtime and ate at an Indian restaurant and used their wifi for a few hours.  Then, we all took a 45 minute helicopter ride into the southern part of the delta, which was mostly dried up until it floods again.  The water starts in Angola and I think a guide said that it would reach the end of the delta by April.

​After the helicopter ride we stopped at the store to stock up on more supplies and then went to the lodge in Maun, the same one we stayed at five days earlier.

After lunch we had more 'siesta' time until about 4pm, so people took showers, took naps, read, etc.  I was able to hand-wash some laundry, which dried in about an hour in the very hot sun.  I think the temperatures reached the mid-90s, but it wasn't humid.

​During the afternoon game drive we saw a lot of the animals that we had seen in the morning, so I didn't take too many pictures this time.  We stayed until the park closed at 7pm and then had dinner.