Ano Petralona is the Athens that hasn't been renovated into something else — a working quarter under the green flank of Filopappou, where the tavernas still use paper tablecloths and the square is still a square. It feels like a village because, function by function, it still works like one. Come in the evening, when the grills light and the neighbourhood comes back out.
Start at the old Metro 1 station and walk up Troon, the everyday spine, to Plateia Merkouri — the square the quarter gathers around, tables everywhere, no one rushing. The tavernes (family tavernas) here run the old way: turn up, wine from the barrel, whatever's good off the grill. Ask who's playing; rebetiko, the urban blues the 1922 refugees brought, still plays live and late in a room or two, and not for tourists.
Then climb the stepped lanes to the upper edge, where the city falls away and Filopappou's green begins, past the chapel of Agioi Asomatoi sta Skala. Back down Troon to the station, the grills trailing after you.
