Exhilarated (and exhausted) from our wedding weekend, we arrived in Athens at 2 am. Our brilliant plan was to explore the city in the wee hours of the morning before checking into our hotel room, which wouldn't be available until later in the day. The city was pitch black as we started to explore. Maybe we ate something, I can't quite remember, before we decided to wind our way up to see the Parthenon in the dark.

It started with one stray dog but before we knew it there were at least 4 of them, following us wherever we'd go. We'd try to lose them but they were too smart. Like something out of a borderline scary Disney movie, the dogs seemed to call to each other. As the hours passed and the city woke up, it wasn't funny anymore. The dogs began acting as our guard dogs, barking menacingly at anyone who approached on the same side of the street. Locals started crossing the street to avoid us, shooting dirty looks. How do you say "these aren't are frickin dogs" in Greek? Around 7 am, we darted into the busiest intersection we could find, looking back in relief to see that we'd finally lost our pack of guard dogs. There started a week of exploring Athens and it's ouzo, traveling to Nauplion in the Peloponnese, and a beautiful couple days in Santorini.