The National Garden

While in Athens, we visited the National Garden. Unfortunately, we were only able to visit a small portion of it. However, I could not help but notice that various areas of the ground were raised to what looked like little underground tunnels. I took this as the defense to combat erosion since the city does not have any natural waterways. In fact, Athens has built over all three of its natural rivers.

While on our tour of the garden, we were told that the Queen who commissioned it's design imported over 500 species of plants and animals. Many of those plants were found to not be able to survive in the Mediterranean climate, however, those plants and animals that did survive have now become a part of the surrounding landscape. For instance the duck population has become overrun not only affecting the life of plants in the National Garden but also ducks can be seen throughout the city. We found all of this interesting since it could have a huge impact on people's health within the city.