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Comment by WD-42 | Hacker News Reader

One huge difference between Nashville’s Parthenon and the real one is that at the real one you have to hike for 30min on an ancient road, pass through many old ruins, before you get to it. It’s epic. The one in Nashville has a gigantic parking lot full of tour busses, complete with a hot dog stand.

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Unlike the Great Pyramids of Giza where you have to run the gauntlet of souvenir sellers to get to them. It quite diminishes their majesty.

It is an American Parthenon afterall.

Of course, it's not like I'd expect anything else. But it was a fun observation since I've been to both.

Is there a gift shop in the real one?

No, from what I could tell the greeks have tried to preserve the entire Acropolis as it was in ancient times. Unfortunately this means there is construction equipment everywhere as they are constantly trying to rebuild, at least when I was there.

Pretty much every shop/business surrounding the Acropolis is a gift shop, they all sell little souvenirs and stuff.

You can't go in to the real one. The real one was destroyed in 1687 when it was being used as a gunpowder depot(!), and then triggered by a mortar round.

They've been slowly rebuilding it over the last 50 years, but it's nowhere near done. It involves figuring out where each and every block goes, often undoing previous reconstructions. You won't be going inside it any time soon.

There are gift shops everywhere, of course, but I highly recommend the one at the Acropolis Museum (at the bottom of the hill). It does a great job of putting the site into historical and archeological context.

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