A late postcard from Arisaloniki.
I set off from heathrow on the 12-15 flight on monday with my young travelling companion Scott and arrived in Athens at about 6-00 Greek time. We had a bit of time to kill so we headed straight for MacDonalds in the airport for dinner before catching up with the rest of the blues who were flying in from other parts of the UK and then killed a bit of time in the bar before we caught the connecting flight to Thesaloniki. On the second flight we sat with some Aris fans and chatted about football till we touched down in Thesaloniki and when we arrived they waited for us to put us on the number 78 bus to the town centre. Arriving in Aristotolous square we then hunted around for our hotel and came to a doorway with a flight of stairs leading up to a small reception area and checked in (as soon as i saw them stairs i thought to myself this is a knocking shop) Anyway we headed to our room and dumped the bags and headed off back to the square which was right by the sea and found a pub with a group of blues sitting outside and went in to get a drink but the bar owner said that he was closing because he was running out of beer but had a couple of beers left and said we could have them on the house seeing that we were his last customers (nice touch) When everybody had finished their beer we headed off to another pub and settled down outside clearing them out of kaiser and mythos beer so we just ended up drinking whatever he had on offer. About 1-00 in the morning a group of about a dozen young Greek lads (PAOK fans) all dressed in black started moving towards us singing and looking up for it then three of our lads got up and walked straight to them and as good as asked them if they want to come and have a drink with us or have a tear up or just carry on walking, they looked at us and saw that we were ready to accomodate whatever they wanted and they shook hands with our lads and went on their way. Eventually this bar ran out of beer and we moved on and i bumped into a few of our younger blues around 2-00 in the morning and they told me they had a nightmare getting in after flying into Athens and getting a train on to Thesaloniki but none of them had paid their fare and when the ticket inspector got on tried to fine them 90 euros and they were'nt going to pay it so he slung them off the train at the next stop so it was a long old haul for them to get in. We headed off to MacDonalds to grab a bite to eat and ended up in a pub called "the pub" (strange name for a pub) and finished the night off drinking and singing and headed off back to our sleazy hotel at about 5-00 in the morning. I had just got my head down when i started hearing through the paper thin walls sounds of ooh, aah, ee, oorre and realised that i was right that it was a fucking brothel but none the less i stuck my head under the pillow and got to sleep.
Tuesday morning we got up at about 11-00 and headed down to MacDonalds for breakfast and then headed down to the square where all the blues were meeting and met up with all the usual suspects for a drink and we were informed that we was all supposed to meet up at the white tower down by the beach at 3-15 to get bussed into the ground as there was no turnstyles at the ground for away fans and that we wouldn't get in. I wasn't sure at first about this idea as that was nearly 4 hours to kick off but we started walking down the beach road towards the tower and met a few of our other mates in a bar and decided that we will take our chances and make our own way to the ground. After scoffing pizza and more beer we headed back to the square where there were plenty of blues that were also going to take their chances about getting to the ground late. We got a taxi and headed for the ground at around 5-30 and was dropped off close to where the cab driver told us that this was the away end and moved on via an off licence to the away section where there was a small bar that had just run out of beer. Time was pushing and i still had a spare ticket in my pocket that i had bought just in case my son could get time off college and i thought that this ticket would be wasted until i heard a group of Greek lads (PAOK fans) asking if anybody had any spare tickets, well i was on them like a rash and offloaded my spare and then found two more spares for them from blues queuing up to get in.
I am not sure if me ducking and diving from the bar to the gate sparked concern with all the riot police surrounding us but the top cozzer decided that his boys should herd us into the ground with their riot shields. Anyway into the ground after being searched three times and onto the game which wasn't exactly inspireing but in the second half all the crowd i was stood with started getting text messages that we were flashed on the telly three times.
Final whistle and we managed to outsing the Aris crowd inbetween a few of their dicks throwing bottles at us and our dicks throwing them back, the riot police surrounding us said that it was normal and to just ignore them and they will go home. So locked in for one hour we were finally let out of the ground and straight out to be bussed back to the square and into MacDonalds again before heading off to "the pub" where we stayed till 5-00 in the morning. Off back to the brothel when a load of dogs decide to chase us, i tried to do the crocodile dundee thing but the stupid Greek dogs just didn't understand it so best thing to do was just run. Anyway we got away from them and made our way back to the hotel via MacDonalds and crashed out at 6-00 am.
Up at 11-00 on wednesday morning and straight down to MaccyDees for breakfast and on the bus back to the airport.
Overall a great European trip, roll on Kiev.
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