Santorini
Trip Start
Jan 05, 2008
1
43
61
Trip End
Jun 20, 2008
Santorini,
Greece
Thursday, April 3, 2008
We left our hostel at 6 in the morning, caught the metro to the port. The ferry left at about 7.30am and after 8 hours we arrived in Santorini. The ride in the ferry was somewhat ok, as it rocked a lot more than I expected for such big ferry. We also sat at a cafe the entire time because we bought the cheapest tickets, which do not have seats assigned. We were actually lucky to have found those seats by some quiet people. When we arrived at the island our transfer was waiting for us and we were taken to a hotel other than what we were booked for. The hotel actually gave us an upgrade to a 4 star hotel for the same price. The hotel from the outside was gorgeous, but the room lacked some good features, like something to hold the water in the shower instead of having the entire bathroom wet.... we walked around the town of Thira (or Fira) which is the main town in the island and grabbed some dinner.. the worst soup so far!! We walked a little more after dinner and were able to presence a gorgeous sunset from Thira.
Day 2
We rented a 4 wheeler to get around the island
On the way to Santorini
. We decided to start with the south of the Island today and do the north tomorrow but we ended up doing it all in one day. In the south, we visited Megalochori, a traditional village. Then to Perissa, which is a black sand beach that we found by mistake as we got lost, and then we went to the Red Beach - a beach where the sand is red because of lava rocks. This spot is interesting as it is the only red spot in the island and all the other beaches are black sanded also because of the volcanic activities the island suffered years ago. Later we went to the island lighthouse and then we went to the ancient Thira, which was just closing at the time we were arriving. Since we still had half of the day, we went to the north of the island, to Oia (or Ia) where you have most of the houses built on the cliffs. It is interesting that you walk thru the village and you are actually walking on the roofs of the houses...the streets are all in the top and to get to the houses you have to go downhill thru steps. The architecture really gets to you. All the houses are very similar from the outside in their shapes nd colors. You will have a better feeling from the pictures. We had dinner in Oia and headed back to Thira by sunset. Day 3
Since we covered the entire island in one day we took our time today. We headed to the Ancient Thira - this time with enough time to get there during open hours. The place reminded us of Machu Picchu as it is a "hidden" city on top of the mountain all built up of rocks. To get to the main gate we had to go thru a zig zag stone road which with the 4 wheeler made it very bumpy but we made it. We spent about 40 minutes up there and when we started heading down the rain started. We had to be very cautious going down the stone road because it was very slippery (Jarrett almos fell 3 times up the ancient city because of the slippery rocks). The rain got worse so we went back to the hotel and spent the rest of the day in Thira or in the hotel. At least we were able to enjoy Santorini with two sunny days otherwise it would have been a waste.
