Places connieZ Wants to Go

150 or so scrounged-up lamps, chandeliers, and lanterns light up this alley in central Athens.

This post-Ottoman era church in Athens was built by locals to serve the residents of Anafiotica

Dating from the 18th century to today, this museum houses a collection of over 1,200 musical instruments.

The home of Greece’s national poet sits crumbling in the middle of a popular tourist district.

One of the best collections of Byzantine art housed in a magnificent, 19th-century neoclassical home.

Catch raucous live performances of traditional tunes at this old-school taverna.

The Lobotesis family has been baking some of the best savory pies in Athens since 1910.

Tear apart fatty, gently charred lamb chops with your bare hands.

A Byzantine church containing the holy remnants of three saints sits atop the site of an ancient temple.

This abandoned shopping arcade has new life as an art installation.

According to legend, this ancient column contains healing properties.

The site where hundreds of Greeks were tortured by the Nazi secret police is now a cosmetics store.

A sprawling collection of books and manuscripts about ancient Greece that would have put their famed libraries to shame.

A man's head is enshrined beneath a statue near the first building constructed for the modern Olympic Games.

This small museum once served as a royal hunting pavilion for King Otto Friedrich Ludwig.

With no menu and no sign, this 130-year-old taverna doles out affordable home cooking.

The oldest standing Byzantine church in Athens is tucked within a monastery in the middle of an upscale shopping district.

This gem is often wrongly overshadowed by the larger, newer Metropolis church in Athens.

Gladiators once walked this ancient, subterranean passage.

Where commuters walk through remnants of an ancient Greek necropolis.

The ruined doorway is a portal to the building's turbulent and torturous past.

A sharp sculpture made of thousands of pieces of jagged glass.

Legend says this sacred tree was a gift from goddess Athena.

Heralded as the world's first theater, these ruins are often overlooked as they reside in the shadows of the Acropolis.