Ancient ruins and high lookouts are the easy wins with kids here: old stones to explore, temples to spot from below, and the whole city spread out under you from the top. These are the landmarks and viewpoints we'd plan a morning around. Go early or late in the day, bring water and hats, and expect uneven ground at the ancient sites, so a carrier beats a stroller.
Lycabettus is a limestone hill rising 277 meters over central Athens, the highest point in the city center, with pine trees around its base. A funicular runs up inside a 210-meter tunnel from Kolonaki in about 3 minutes, or families can climb the trail. At the top sit the Chapel of St. George, a café-restaurant, an open-air theater and views across the city to the Acropolis.
The Panathenaic Stadium, known locally as Kallimarmaro (beautiful marble), is the only stadium in the world built entirely of marble. It hosted the first modern Olympics in 1896 and is still the finish line of the Athens Marathon.
Kids can run onto the track, climb the marble stands, pose on the podium, walk the vaulted passage, and see Olympic torches and posters from 1896 to today in the museum.
Emperor Hadrian built this library in AD 132: a walled rectangle with a Corinthian gateway on its west side, a courtyard ringed by columns, and reading and lecture halls.
The courtyard also holds the remains of churches later built on the ruins, including a 5th-century church with four apses. A marked path of beaten earth, suited to wheelchairs and strollers, runs in from the Dexippos Street entrance.
The Roman Agora is the ruined market square Augustus paid for around 2,000 years ago, north of the Acropolis. Kids enter through the Gate of Athena Archegetis, a Doric marble gateway, and cross to the Tower of the Winds.
The octagonal tower stands 12 meters tall with a carved wind god on each side and eight sundials. It once held a water clock, and Roman public latrines stood beside it.
Kerameikos was the potters' quarter and a major cemetery of ancient Athens, and the English word "ceramic" comes from its name. Paths run past grave monuments on the Street of Tombs, the remains of the Dipylon and Sacred Gates, and the Eridanos stream, where some water still flows.
A small museum holds the original grave sculptures and burial finds, from marble stelae to jewelry and toys.
The Ancient Agora was the marketplace and meeting ground of ancient Athens, on the slope below the Acropolis. Paths lead past the Temple of Hephaestus, the Byzantine Church of the Holy Apostles and the remains of law courts and shops, under oak and laurel trees planted since 1954.
The rebuilt Stoa of Attalos holds the site museum, where exhibits show how Athenian democracy worked.
A flat-topped rock 150 m above sea level, crowned by temples built in the fifth century BC: the Parthenon, the Propylaea gateway, the Erechtheion and the small Temple of Athena Nike. Kids can spot the Erechtheion porch held up by stone women (the caryatids), and the ancient Theatre of Dionysus sits on the south slope.
Suits school-age kids who know a few Greek myths more than toddlers.
Pyrgos Vasilissis, also called the Queen's Tower, is a 200-hectare estate built around a small neo-Gothic castle that King Otto raised for Queen Amalia, modeled on Hohenschwangau in Bavaria. Today the Serpieri family owns it and runs a dairy farm and an organic vineyard on the grounds.
Visits take in the tower and the gardens. It suits kids who like castles and history more than toddlers after a run-around.
Ancient ruins and high lookouts are the easy wins with kids here: old stones to explore, temples to spot from below, and the whole city spread out under you from the top. These are the landmarks and viewpoints we'd plan a morning around. Go early or late in the day, bring water and hats, and expect uneven ground at the ancient sites, so a carrier beats a stroller.
Lycabettus is a limestone hill rising 277 meters over central Athens, the highest point in the city center, with pine trees around its base. A funicular runs up inside a 210-meter tunnel from Kolonaki in about 3 minutes, or families can climb the trail. At the top sit the Chapel of St. George, a café-restaurant, an open-air theater and views across the city to the Acropolis.
The Panathenaic Stadium, known locally as Kallimarmaro (beautiful marble), is the only stadium in the world built entirely of marble. It hosted the first modern Olympics in 1896 and is still the finish line of the Athens Marathon.
Kids can run onto the track, climb the marble stands, pose on the podium, walk the vaulted passage, and see Olympic torches and posters from 1896 to today in the museum.
Emperor Hadrian built this library in AD 132: a walled rectangle with a Corinthian gateway on its west side, a courtyard ringed by columns, and reading and lecture halls.
The courtyard also holds the remains of churches later built on the ruins, including a 5th-century church with four apses. A marked path of beaten earth, suited to wheelchairs and strollers, runs in from the Dexippos Street entrance.
The Roman Agora is the ruined market square Augustus paid for around 2,000 years ago, north of the Acropolis. Kids enter through the Gate of Athena Archegetis, a Doric marble gateway, and cross to the Tower of the Winds.
The octagonal tower stands 12 meters tall with a carved wind god on each side and eight sundials. It once held a water clock, and Roman public latrines stood beside it.
Kerameikos was the potters' quarter and a major cemetery of ancient Athens, and the English word "ceramic" comes from its name. Paths run past grave monuments on the Street of Tombs, the remains of the Dipylon and Sacred Gates, and the Eridanos stream, where some water still flows.
A small museum holds the original grave sculptures and burial finds, from marble stelae to jewelry and toys.
The Ancient Agora was the marketplace and meeting ground of ancient Athens, on the slope below the Acropolis. Paths lead past the Temple of Hephaestus, the Byzantine Church of the Holy Apostles and the remains of law courts and shops, under oak and laurel trees planted since 1954.
The rebuilt Stoa of Attalos holds the site museum, where exhibits show how Athenian democracy worked.
A flat-topped rock 150 m above sea level, crowned by temples built in the fifth century BC: the Parthenon, the Propylaea gateway, the Erechtheion and the small Temple of Athena Nike. Kids can spot the Erechtheion porch held up by stone women (the caryatids), and the ancient Theatre of Dionysus sits on the south slope.
Suits school-age kids who know a few Greek myths more than toddlers.
Pyrgos Vasilissis, also called the Queen's Tower, is a 200-hectare estate built around a small neo-Gothic castle that King Otto raised for Queen Amalia, modeled on Hohenschwangau in Bavaria. Today the Serpieri family owns it and runs a dairy farm and an organic vineyard on the grounds.
Visits take in the tower and the gardens. It suits kids who like castles and history more than toddlers after a run-around.
