For 36 hours, this was the place to be.
Tuesday night the streets were awash with people in town to see the Olympic shot put. The restaurants were packed. After centuries of relative solitude, Olympia was abuzz.
By Thursday morning, the only buzz was the sound of cicadas.
The throngs had disappeared like 1,611-year-locusts.
No wonder that even in the midst of Wednesday’s festive atmosphere, local shop owner Maria Anastopoulos was pessimistic about any long-term impact from the return of the Olympics to Olympia.
“Business is bad, and I don’t expect any improvement,” she said.
By 10:30 p.m. Wednesday, barely three hours after the shot put and wreath-giving ceremony had ended in the ancient stadium, most of the restaurants on Olympia’s main street were closing.
That is unheard of in a country where many people don’t begin dining until the later hours.
“I expect the number of tourists will increase after this,” said Tasia Tsoukala, a restaurant owner. “But there have not been many until [Tuesday].”
Despite the lure of the ruins of the sanctuary and stadium where the ancient Olympics took place from 776 B.C. to A.D. 393, the town is too far from the beaten path to attract an influx of people like the estimated 25,000 who descended on it for the shot put.
All the tickets were free, and 15,000 each were available for the morning qualifying and evening final. Spectators sat on the hillsides on either side of the stadium.
“I felt the spirit of people sitting here and watching in ancient times,” said Kiryakos Kazevos, 14, of Napflion, who came to the morning session.
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Spectator Aresthusa Makri of Athens, making her fourth visit, thought the impression left by bringing the Games back to Olympia would be felt elsewhere in Greece.
“This is a place that really inspires people,” she said. “It will inspire many young people to get involved in sport.”