The picture of santorini that is always shown is the one of the blue domed church with the white walls overlooking the ocean. Santorini is quite beautiful, but not quite what I expected. It is very dry and not lush at all.
I arrived in Santorini after a long ferry ride (10 hours) from Athens. I was travelling with who I estimated were the only sane people that I met at Pink Palace. One a 21 year old college student in Vancouver. She was at the age where she was graduating from college -in "marketing"- and had it all figured out. I think when you are at that age you think you know everything, but really don't know anything. It was cute at first, but wearing after a while.
The other woman was a 36 year old who was previously president of a small retail company in australia before she quit to travel the world. We obviously had a lot to talk about. She was really cool. I had met the older woman in corfu and we had done some paddling there and she was pretty kick ass as aussie girls tend to be. I think we paddled for like 5 hours or something. It was good to get some real excercise, since it is often hard to come by while travelling. Except walking of course.
When you arrive in Santorini you get of the ferry and are instantly bombarded by like 50 greek guys who want you to stay in their hotel. They will lie and tell you ANYTHING to try to get you to stay in their place. A word of advice: whatever distance they tell you their hotel is from the beach, multiply that number by 5 or 6. Our hotel was supposedly 400 meters, and turned out to be about 2 km. Heard similar stories from others. Anyway, the guy drove us to his place, and since it was the beginning of low season in the greek isles, they were willing to negotiate and we got 2 rooms for 30 euro a night. I got my own room since I was the guy, so that was great at 10 e a night, obviously.
Spent one day with aussie and we rented mopeds -for 8 euro each- and saw the whole island. It was great fun! The beaches aren't that great since they are pretty rocky, but the island is beautiful and there is a lot to see.
The little town of Fira has some of the best views I have ever seen. It is high on the cliff and most of the bars and restaurants there overlook the ocean. It is pretty incredible.
The town of Fira itself is pretty high-end. It reminded me a little of Capri with expensive jewelry and clothes shops. It was still pretty cool.
Second day we all rented a car since the vancouver girl wasn't confident on a moped and drove around a bit. Took a boat cruise, but that was a little bit of a disappointment. The cruises advertise that they will take you to the volcano and the hot springs. I had thought that the volcano was active, but it's just a big ugly dirty old volcanic rock that they drop you off on for an hour and laugh all the way back as they go to pick up another boatload of tourists. The views back to Santorini are nice, but the rock itself is boring.
The "hot springs" should actually be called the "dirty lukewarm springs". That was disappointment as well.
After the boat cruise we visited a winery that we had seen from the road. We happened upon a small greek wedding at the winery in an absolutely fantastic location. They were saying their vows as the sun set behind them with the cliffs and the ocean at their backs. It was beautiful.
We all shared a bottle of wine and cried and planned our own weddings. Not really. We had picked up some Baklava at a bakery, some regular, some with chocolate sprinked on the top, and some with crushed pisachios. It was so great! It was wet and not dry like I have had in the states, and one of the best desserts I've had before.
We stayed there and watched the sun set, and was really a nice time.
Went to a pretty good local restaurant that night in Fira. Was good food, but the owner kept coming over and bugging us. "You lucky man! You with two beautful girls! Wow!" He kept bringing us free drinks which was nice at first, but just annoying after a while. He had a thing for the australian woman and she was pretty creeped. "You lovely couple can come stay with me anytime!" Yikes. We didn't leave a tip.
Left next day, me for Istanbul, the women for Mykonos. It was nice travelling with two women, but off again on my own. The lone wolf. Just kidding.