The ferry arrived at Patras in the late evening and by that time, I was clean, refreshed and relaxed. There were a number of market stalls near the port which were selling all sorts of different foods and pastries, so I indulged myself a bit.

Most of the people on the ferry were heading for the Greek Islands (ones that weren’t eighteen thirty) and headed off to various places to find taxis, buses, ferries or whatever. A relatively small crowd of us headed to the station for the train to Athens. The trains also run to GMT, which made the Italian trains look punctual, and I played cards in the station with a couple of other lads until it eventually got round to turning up.

Take it from me that the Greeks on the islands are the nicest people you are ever likely to meet. The Greeks on the mainland, however, are complete assholes. They hate tourists, and inter-railers most of all. When we got on the train, bags were suddenly placed on all the empty seats and they flatly refused to move them. Things got very heated and we were surprised to discover that the Greeks recognised most of the English swear words that they were on the receiving end of.

There was absolutely no tourist information in Athens, and you were basically left to wander around lost. The Acropolis is, fortunately, on top of a hill so you can eventually spot it and then head in that direction.

It cost an absolute fortune to get in and it wasn't worth it. Mind you, it would have been a waste to go to Athens and not go in as there was bugger-all else to see. I was also a bit gutted, as this was the first time that someone rejected my long-expired international Student Union card. I should have got one of the fakes in Bangkok.

Wandering around the Acropolis, I met the two guys that I’d been playing cards with the night before. They were also questioning the logic of travelling all the way to Athens and were considering going to Istanbul. They invited me to tag along.

Travelling on your own may be lonely at times, particularly in the evenings, but more often than not you are travelling with other people anyway. It has the advantage that when you no longer want to do the same thing, you can just go your separate ways without having to come to some compromise.

The Greeks on the train to Istanbul were true to form. We all got comfortable and then some Greeks got on and demanded that we let them have our seats. We refused, which obviously came as a bit of a culture shock for them. After a lot of shouting, they eventually stormed out and started to pick on the people in the next compartment, just in time for some more to come in and start on us again.

There was one Greek woman in the compartment who was praying, very loudly, throughout the journey. We can't have been that bad, surely.