Piraeus is Athens's port — sprawling, industrial, and very much a working city rather than a tourist destination, yet worth knowing if you're catching a ferry to the Greek islands or simply want to eat excellent seafood away from the crowds. It has been Athens's main harbour since antiquity and today handles a huge volume of ferry traffic to the Aegean and Ionian islands.
The waterfront around Mikrolimano — the small yacht harbour on the eastern side — is the most pleasant part of the city, lined with seafood restaurants that pack out on summer evenings. Above it rises the hill of Kastella, a quarter of white 19th-century houses with views over the Saronic Gulf. The fish here comes off the boats daily. The main commercial port is functional rather than charming, but the scale is impressive.
In town, the Archaeological Museum holds the cache of bronze statues found by accident in 1959, and the Hellenic Maritime Museum traces Greek seafaring across the millennia. Piraeus sits at the end of Athens Metro Line 1, about 20 minutes from Monastiraki. It's the departure point for ferries to virtually all the Aegean islands; most ferry companies have offices along Akti Miaouli on the main harbour front.