Kifisia: the garden suburb at the end of the line
The cool northern suburb where Athens summered — Kefalari's springs, belle-époque villas, plane trees. This is a Claude-drafted route awaiting the editor's walk.

1. Kifisia station and Platanos square
Step off the M1 — the line that's brought Athenians up here to escape the heat since 1885 — and into the square of plane trees out front. The horse carriages still wait here for tourists. Get your bearings under the *platania* (plane trees) before climbing toward Kefalari.

2. Goulandris Natural History Museum
The country's serious natural-history collection, founded by the Goulandris family in an old Kifisia mansion — minerals, fossils, a Greek flora and fauna you won't see assembled anywhere else. Worth an hour if it's open; check before you go.

3. The belle-époque villas
The streets between station and Kefalari are lined with the summer villas the Athenian bourgeoisie built from the 1880s on — turrets, verandas, overgrown gardens behind high walls. Walk slowly and look over the gates; some are restored, some gently rotting, all of them telling the same story.

4. Kefalari springs and the plane trees
*Kefalari* is where the springs of the Kifisos river surface under enormous old plane trees, and the air drops a few degrees. This shaded hollow is the whole reason the suburb exists. Stand under the biggest tree and listen to the water.

5. Panagia tis Kapnikareas (the Kefalari chapel)
The small rock-set chapel above the springs, half-built into the slope. A short climb for a quiet corner away from the cafés. Skip it if your legs are done, but it's the calmest spot on the walk.

6. The Kefalari café terraces
End among the cafés ringing the Kefalari hollow under the planes — the Athenian weekend institution, ice coffee and conversation in the cool. Take a terrace table, then walk back down to the M1 at your own pace.

Kifisia: the garden suburb at the end of the line