Santorini

Hey guys,

Just got back late last Sunday night from our wonderful weekend in Santorini.

Friday morning we left around 5:30 am to catch the 7 hour ferry. We caught the metro, and made it to all of our stops on time, but we ran into a little issue.

Pickpockets.

Two of the kids in our group things stolen. Pickpocketing is the weirdest thing. No one ever feels it or sees it. It's not dangerous or violent, but it's such a shock when it happens. When we got on the metro, there were several people around, and you could see they were together, with no bags, so everyone had their hands over their pockets and bags, but just for one second when they weren't looking the 2 in our groups became victims of petty theft.

It was a real bummer so early in our trip, and so early in the morning, but they both had really good attitudes about it and didn't let it ruin their day or weekend.

The ferry ride was really long and I tried hard to find comfortable positions to sleep in on my seat.

Fail.

Instead I got a Frappe.
A Frappe is a iced, instant coffee and espresso drink that is very popular in Greece. I hate coffee, so I still can't quite figure out why I thought that was a good solution. I sipped it, had a caffeine stomach ache and I couldn't sit still for the rest of the ferry ride.

Bad choice for me.

We arrived on the island and all I could see was the pure blue water and the steep cliffs.

We caught the bus up the cliffs, winding back and forth until we reached the town of Fira. Its one of the biggest towns in Santorini. We had a difficult time finding our hotel, walking with backpacks about a half mile past where we should have. When we finally checked in, we realized we forgot one person at the bus station. After sending out a search party, a few others and myself finally located our stranded traveller (Gretchen!). Thankfully, she stayed put where she lost everyone for over an hour so we retraced our steps and found her. 

The rest of the evening went much more smoothly. Me, and my friends Gretchen #1 and Gretchen #2, Ali, Laura, Danielle, and Jen all decided to go to the small and picturesque town of Oia 

(Geeking out: Where they made the movie Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants!)

We got the last bits of the Oia sunset and snapped a few photos with the multi-colored sky.

After the dark settled in, we decided we could splurge a little on a nicer restaurant for dinner. We found an outdoor one with a great view of the lighted houses on the cliff. We got seated at little tables of two and three.

 I ordered the "Oia Spaghetti": 

-Spaghetti

-Zucchini

-Carrots

-Butter and Garlic Sauce

=

Simple, but so delicious

I haven't had pasta in weeks either, so that alone felt decadent.

(Side note: I really miss the cartoon shapes macaroni and cheese). 

We window shopped a little more, there were lots of cool walking streets in the town filled with shops. 

The "Evil Eye" jewlery is everywhere. Its supposed to ward off jealousy and bring good luck

Pretty Turquoise Bracelet

Oia view from the restaurant

We made our way back to Fira and out to the bar where the rest of our group was.

We could hear the dance music coming from the bar from way down the street. 

Somehow, we've developed a habit of turning bars into dance clubs. 

Nonetheless, we made friends with the owner, and all had a great night. 

Saturday was amazing. 

We woke up and walked through Fira, down the donkey path to the old port. We got on a boat cruise that took us to a volcanic caldera. We hiked up the caldera and learned about the volcano. The main crater- St. George's, erupted sometime in the 20th century and is supposed to again by 2026!

When it blows up, I can say I stood there!

The rest of the morning, we spent boating to the hot springs- which stained my white swimming suit red :( 

Some people in our group had some pretty severe motion sickness- so the boat ride back wasn't so pleasant. But hey, there's gotta be worse places to be sick. At least the scenery was nice?

Andrew in front of the old port at Fira

I can't get over the water! My new favorite color, Santorini Blue! See the fish?

Boats at the Caldera

After arriving at the port, some of us decided to ride the infamous donkeys up the cliff back to Fira.

How do I describe the donkey riding experience?

A ten minute mixture of hard laughter, sharp turns, and stubborn animals. I loved every second. 

The donkey man didn't speak much english, but insisted on bellowing "MADAM, MADAM, MADAM" at me and motioning to me to hurry up and get my ass on that ass. 

heh. Yeah right, I'm just gonna go jump on that thing. 

Well, he was scary and loud, so I kind of did.

And then my donkey just took off about 20 feet and then stalled completely. 

I waited for a while, thinking it was a really hot day and the poor guy was just overworked from hauling all these tourists up the cliff.

Once my friends got going, the scary donkey man came up and hit my donkey with some poker stick/whip/zapper thing and my donkey had a little get-up-and-go to bring us up the cliff. 

The donkeys love to race each other at random times, cut each other off, and walk right next to the edge of the walkway, almost tipping you over the side of the cliff, and #1 and #2 all over. 

But they were pretty cute for donkeys.

So fun.

More later! Its 2 am here and I'm gonna have a really hard time getting out of bed tomorrow if I don't stop. I'll tell you all about Saturday afternoon and the rest of Santorini tomorrow!

Love, Kirsten