Kneesles at the Acropolis

ATHENS, Greece — The good old days of travel, when I was on the go all day long, may be gone.

Sad reality thwacked me as I was climbing the hill — it has two parts, the first smooth and paved; the second wickedly slippery and broken — to the Acropolis, one of the most familiar profiles in the world, crowning this ancient, glorious and graffiti-smeared capital.

The first half was moderately steep, but wide and paved with something like flat Belgian blocks. After a shaded rest stop at a plateau, the group I was with — all taking the Chat Tours $77 half-day city tour — faced the much steeper upper half, paved with slippery limestone, when there were paths, as we had been warned by tour guide Giota. We were often climbing over what looked like mammoth stone blocks thrown like dice by the gods.

I was looking forward to the challenge because I like heights and I've always liked climbing things, even when an elevator or funicular was available. To me, scaling monuments is urban mountain-climbing.

My first was London's Monument to the Great Fire — a 200-foot tall Doric column surrounding a 311-step winding staircase. Next was St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, where visitors can climb to the roof to view the square below as seen by few other than the pope.

I climbed the Statue of Liberty, Ayers rock (now called Uluru), the 1,142-foot sandstone formation in Australia's Outback, and Israel's sun-baked mountain-top fortress of Masada, 1,300 feet above the Judean desert.

Most were challenging and I'm not going to tell you I wasn't out of breath and my thighs and calves didn't burn. I was and they did, but it was worth the experience, and the bragging rights.

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Nearing the summit of the Acropolis, heeding Giota's warnings, most of us were very cautious. Having no concept of being in the care of Visiting Angels, millennials scampered up, nimble as mountain goats.

I left the path to climb down some rocks — neither deep nor steep — to get an unobstructed picture of the glistening Athens panorama below. I wore sneakers for traction, but the stone was worn smooth and lacked crevices big enough for my size 13 foot. I moved gingerly while my girl friend remained on the path above as she is driven neither by my travel history nor my male zeal.

I reached a railing, waited for some Japanese tourists to snap their shots, took mine and turned to find a safe route back to the path above.

I felt like Sir Edmund Hillary surveying Mount Everest.

There were a few narrow foot paths, none looking great.

I crouched forward for balance but since I can't help being male, I didn't want to look clumsy or cowardly.

A step to the left, pause for balance, then slide right to a rock and survey again. I started less than four feet below the path and got three-quarters of the way up when I came to the last obstacle — a 14-inch step to the path from a rock. I thought about which leg to use for balance, which one to raise. Either way, 14 inches isn't that high, is it?

Then I was hit with the hammer of truth. Once I got my foot on the path, I thought I would not be able to raise myself up. Call it kneesles.

That was illuminating and devastating. I never before hesitated to do something that clearly always had been within my grasp.

My girl friend stood on the path above, urging me to be careful. The issue was no longer safety — but ability.

I looked up and said, "I need your hand."

Even as I said it, I knew this was a bad deal. I'm Gulliver, she's a Lilliputian. I outweigh her by 100 pounds and she hasn't got a blacksmith's arm strength. (Crawling on all fours would have been safer, but emasculating.)

As she stretched down for me, I geared up, lifted my left leg, planted my foot on the path — but my knee would not straighten to provide lift. Kneesles.

She had my hand, but I was frozen for a couple of seconds until an American in a Milwaukee T-shirt grabbed my elbow, gave a pull up. I thanked him.

I was none the worse for wear except for this: I got the rotten news that there are things I had always taken for granted that I could not take for granted any more. Such as my knees working right.

There were earlier hints. A few years back I realized I was unconsciously bending from the waist to pick things off the floor instead of bending my knees as I always had. Yes, I was a senior citizen, but had breezed past AARP eligibility without slowing down. That was for other people, not me.

Are those days over?

On the rest of the slog to the Parthenon, I sought handrails, used my eyes to find cement patches rather than walk on glassy rock, and walked around obstacles rather than climb over them.

The summit, with its ruined monuments, is a sea of obstacles. Most tourists pick their way through the course slowly, with care.

Suddenly, I'm one of them. Moving around the Parthenon, the Propylaia, the Erechthelon and the temple of Athena Nike was not hard, but demanded attention. I gave it.

After spending more than an hour at the summit, wandering among the ruins, it was time for the descent, and I had a new mental framework.

As in mountain-climbing, urban monument climbing is more dangerous going down than going up. Slow beats fast, rough surfaces beat smooth ones, level is better than steep, even if it means taking a few extra steps.

After reaching the bottom, the tour bus took us to the nearby Acropolis Museum, an angular, four-story structure that opened in 2009 to great reviews.

As our group was lectured by Giota about pottery on the first floor, she said the architects deliberately installed a high staircase — pointing to the back of the hall — to recreate the uphill climb to the Acropolis.

I was not the only one thinking "Is this really necessary," because several people said, "Is this really necessary?"

Necessary or not, there it was and up we went.

That's where I found my knees weren't working well even on the relatively short height of each step. Kneesles.

After the tour, my girl friend and I had some gelato to cool off and discovered the G.D.S. souvenir store 3 Makrigianna St. near the museum. The prices were very good.

I asked the shopkeeper why the prices were so low.

"The boss is a communist," he replied.

Greek humor? Anyway, we loaded up and returned to the tour bus for the ride back to our hotel.

We had lunch and rested for a few hours before taking a pre-dinner stroll of a few blocks around our hotel, the Athenaeum InterContinental on Syngrou Ave. The temperature and light were perfect, the N. Kosmos neighborhood quiet. Each time I stepped on to, or off, a curb, I felt stress in my knees.

Kneesles.

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After Athens we took a Greek Island cruise where going up and down the ship's staircases hurt my knees, as did arising from a chair.

Now I am wondering if the change is permanent.

Mentally, I feel the same — raring to go, planning too much to do in a single day. That's the way my travels always had been — see the max because you might not this way come again.

If kneesles turns out to be permanent, I'll adapt, because I have to.

And if that's the case, I'll never forget Athens and the Acropolis, because that's where I lost my knees.