I don’t practice Santorini…

June- 9-11

Santorini

As we get off the ferry from Mykonos arriving to Santorini, I can’t express enough how much easier things are traveling with a backpack rather than rolling luggage. So many people struggling and pulling their luggage on rough uneven grounds. I can’t believe we were the minority. If everyone right now can tell 5 people they know, and if those people can tell 5 friends, and so on… maybe we can stop the madness!

As we walk out of the boat, we follow the crowd to where all the transportation and tour people are waiting . We immediately see a sign with my last name, Sprague. Sorry Jarrett, you’ll just be referred to as Mr. Sprague now. Our transportation from the port to our hotel ended up being a private car. Our driver was a young, 28 year old Greek dude named Nikos. He told us he lives in Santorini for 6 months out of the year (tourist season) and then goes back to Athens and waits for the next season to start. That’s kinda how the life is for all the people that are lucky enough to find work here. If they’re even luckier, they’ll find work in the off season back home and continue to earn an income all year long. This is how my cousin’s job at the hotel in Spain is so I’m very familiar with the struggle.

After driving in the Santorini traffic of a 2 lane road up a curvy mountain for about 30 minutes, we get dropped off at the furthest spot we can go by car. A bell boy from the hotel meets us and helps me with my luggage. We walk on a cobblestone sidewalk for just a few feet and arrive at the hidden entrance of Cliff Side Suites. Everything from the walls and steps is white. We start going down what seems like a hundred steps and immediately catch a glimpse of the immaculate view of the ocean. One word I would describe Santorini as is “cliffy.” We are up really high and can see practically the entire island from here. On the far right we can see Skaros Rock, on the northern most tip of the crescent shaped island. To the left we can see the southern most tip which we later find out is where Santo Wine sits.

We get into our room which is another set of stairs down, and get settled. The hotel was very Greek traditional looking meaning it was entirely white cemented igloo looking rooms. Even the bedsheets were all white and furniture too. One thing that stood out was the purple sink in the bathroom, very random and looked very out of place.

We were hungry and hot so we decided to check out the pool and order some food. The pool wasn’t anything to brag about, but you can’t expect much from a limited space on a cliff. The view made up for that. We ordered a Greek salad to share, and 2 sandwiches. The prices here were already looking significantly lower than Mykonos. We had no problem ordering a cocktail right away. Jarrett ordered a piña colada and I got a mojito. He has yet to get a properly made piña colada. It tasted fine, except it wasn’t frozen or blended.

As we cooled off in the cold water, we noticed a wedding starting to take place right below us. We had front row seats and I definitely wanted to watch. A few other British ladies and I watched and took pictures. As the bride finally made her appearance I couldn’t help but think, why didn’t anyone advise her not to wear her hair down or not to wear a long veil? Santorini is WINDY AF YALL! It was especially windy that day and that girls hair and veil were flying everywhere. She looked absolutely beautiful and wore a Greek style wedding dress that was one shoulder and had some Greek design on the waistline. After the vows, she decided to remove the veil… good call. It was a 10 minute ceremony and I believe the couple was English according to their accents. One of the bridesmaids had her hair dyed bright royal blue. Maybe that was her “something blue”.

It was getting late and we wanted to shower and get ready for dinner. After looking at a couple menus close by our hotel, we decided on a restaurant called Vanilia. Yes, that’s spelled correctly. It had a great view of the much anticipated Santorini sunset. Since it was really windy that evening, they were recommending everyone to not sit on the terrace or open balcony. We settled for a semi open table. A bottle of wine only cost 15€ here so we definitely got a house white. The menu was actually a tad different than what we were seeing everywhere else. Jarrett suggested we get the hummus since we hadn’t had it since day one in Athens and hadn’t seen it on any menu since the but I said let’s take advantage of the variety here and get the garlic Gouda cheese bread. It was a good choice y’all. Jarrett ordered a Fried chicken dish and I ordered a seafood linguini. His fried chicken was kinda like a chicken fried chicken minus the gravy but instead Greek yogurt. Don’t let the healthiness fool you because it was excellent. My linguini was the best linguini I’d ever tasted. It had red marinara sauce, shrimp, and calamari. We were very satisfied with our choices.

Side note: One thing we’ve noticed about restaurants in Greece is if you’re paying with a credit card, they bring the card machine to your table and run it right in front of you. Why hasn’t The States started doing this already?

We finished dinner right as sunset was starting to happen. Since we were sitting in a semi covered patio because of the strong wind, we didn’t have a clear view of it so we left to take some pictures. That tour guide in Mykonos was right, Santorini has THE BEST sunset. Holy cow y’all! It was spectacular. We took a few pictures form a public area and then hurried back to our balcony and watched the rest. What a view! We just sat there and enjoyed it until it was dark and all you could see was the twinkling lights of the entire island.

I dunno if it was the darkness of the Greek igloo we slept in or the comfort of the bed, but we slept 12 hours straight that night. It was impressive. Not so much me because I’ve been known to love my sleep but I’d never seen Jarrett sleep like that ever! It was 11am and we totally missed the breakfast that’s served at our hotel until 10:30am. So we got dressed and looked for some brunch. We found a place close by that offered breakfast type items such as crepes and coffee with a view of course. I ordered a crepe with white chocolate and strawberries with an OJ. Jarrett ordered a chocolate, banana and coconut crepe with a cappuccino. We’d been trying to ration our euro cash to only necessary situations and our bill was 30,50€ and our waiter claimed he didn’t accept credit card which I knew was BS. No one had declined a card this whole time. But his service was so slow and he was swamped so I just gave him cash to just get out of there.

We then decided to do some exploring around town. The hotel receptionist mentioned the town of Fira was just a 10 minute walk. Since we were towards the top of the island, it was just a downhill hike. I could tell it was gonna be a struggle back. We were definitely staying in the middle of everything. Right outside the entrance of our hotel, there were plenty of places to shop and eat. It was super convenient. We found the town of Fira and walked around the streets which just was a continuation of what we were already seeing from the hotel. It was never like a moment of “Welcome to Fira” it just went from kinda crazy crowded to really crazy crowded. We searched on google to see what was around that we could walk to or sightsee. The closest thing in google maps was the “volcanic eruption”? We walked to it and it was just the public bus stop. We thought surely this was a mistake and kept walking around the coordinates that google was giving us. Nothing. We gave up and headed to the next spot: The Three Bells of Thira. It was on the way back to the hotel and everything else was a little further out and we would need to make more time for it. We found signs pointing right to it so we had just missed it on the way to Fira. I even took a picture of it not knowing that was it. This time we saw it from the correct angle and saw that famous view you see in all the movies and magazines. Do people even read magazines anymore? Blogs and websites I should say. A friendly American offered to take our picture.

We were feeling a little fatigued and were sweating from our hike through town so we decided to cool off at the hotel pool before going to Santo Winery for dinner later. Google maps said that it was about an hour walk and we didn’t really do our research so we said we could easily just walk there since it was early and then just take a bus back. We royally messed up there. After showering and getting dressed up, we started our unknown long journey to Santo Winery. As we walked through Fira again and got further south, the crowd started to thin out and the streets started to straighten. Next thing we know we’re on a long road along the island with a tiny little sidewalk. An unbeaten path for sure. We would pass an occasional couple of people that were returning to Fira. I was like ok so we aren’t the only idiots that take this long walk. The further we got, the more we regretted our decision of this journey. It was too late to turn around and there was no bus stop or taxi in sight. An occasional house or store but mostly deserted. We had to bite the bullet and finish the marathon we unknowingly had signed up for. I had bought some of the most comfortable walking sandals in preparation for this trip. They were like walking on marshmallows (Jarrett calls them cloud shoes)…. until now. I had managed to make these perfect walking sandals give me blisters. I didn’t think it was possible. Jarrett got a good taste of marriage that day. He’s amazing and hardly complained, as I moaned in anguish and was on the verge of tears. We saw some signs saying wine road up ahead… lies!! We saw a building that said wine at the far end tip of the island and we asked ourselves, is that it!!? Omg why did we do this!? We still had 20 minutes of walking left. It seemed like no end in sight. But sure enough, all misery comes to an end and we reached and uphill road with no sidewalk and made it to our destination. I’d never been so relieved to see people and wine.

Santo Wines is the oldest winery in Santorini and made all their wines from the grapes grown there and another island across from the volcano. We walked up and asked for a table for 2 and were seated immediately. It was pretty empty at the moment, but it was still early for dinner about 6:15pm. Out of all the empty seats we got sat at a table directly next to 2 Australians. They were so obnoxiously loud. The guy was a big overweight loud mouthed “bro”. Jarrett and I had invented a name for these guys when we are on our trips. We call them “douche-cations”. He was totally a douche-cation. His wife who was also obnoxious had bright raspberry colored hair. They were bickering loudly and Jarrett and I couldn’t help but just sit quietly and listen while we attempted to read the menu.

I had definitely taken off my shoes at this point. I just wanted wine and enjoy the sunset. I looked over at their table and noticed that they had just about finished their 16 glasses of wine tasting. Thank god. They were leaving soon. They asked for their check and as they waited for their server, douche-cation struck up a conversation with a local behind us and asked to steal a cigarette. He then decided to ask his life story and talk about how much money he spent in Mykonos partying the days prior. The whole side of the winery we were sitting in you couldn’t here anything but this guy’s loud conversation. I couldn’t hear anything else. We were sitting in an entirely open aired area y’all!

They finally left before sunset started and more and more people started arriving. We had ordered the tasting special for 2 persons. It included a tasting of 5 wines: 3 whites, 1 red, and 1 dessert. It also included a Greek salad, a grilled octopus dish, a pork tenderloin dish, and for dessert a brownie and ice cream. Everything was delightful except for the ice cream. The flavor was really strange, I thought it tasted like lemongrass. I powered through it because hey… it’s ice cream and I can’t eat a brownie without it.

We enjoyed the rest of the sunset and took some pictures.

It was about 8:15pm and we decided to try and look for a bus stop because there was no way in hell we were making the trip back by foot. After attempting to find the right bus stop on our own, we went back to the winery and asked someone to be sure. Sure enough we would have chosen the wrong spot so ask for help people! Everyone is super nice and speaks English so there’s no reason to try to risk making a mistake. We waited and waited and every bus that passed, we stood up and they never stopped. A crowd started to wait with us. An Asian guy asked us if the bus we were waiting for went to Perissa, another town opposite direction of ours. We said no we were headed back to Fira. I told him he should probably head over to the opposite side of the street at the other bus stop since that was the direction he was wanting to go, but he stayed. I tried y’all. Oh well, it’s a small island… he’ll get there eventually.

A lady came off a charter bus at our stop, and as we stood up thinking it was the bus we needed, she said it wasn’t and we should look for a green colored bus. Thanks lady!

It finally came at about 9:00pm and it took probably an hour to get to our bus stop in Fira. The bus took us through other little towns we hadn’t seen yet. We then had to hike it back up to our hotel from Fira. Finally, we made it to our room and I wasted no time and tucked myself in for some sleep. We turned on the tv and watched a little bit of a movie but the commercial breaks were almost as long as the show time so once we got to the 3rd commercial break we gave up and fell asleep. This time we set an alarm for 9:30am just in case so we wouldn’t miss breakfast again.

Breakfast was served by the pool here and we got ourselves a table underneath some shade. The choices were a little limited but had the typical eggs, bacon and fruit, but the coffee was good.

Today we were going to tackle the hike to Skaros Rock that was on the northern tip of Santorini. We put on our sporty attire and closed toed shoes and headed out. It was a good mix of down hill and up hill. We definitely felt a little out of shape by the way we were huffing and puffing up those stairs. It was a spectacular view for sure. We got to the end and all that was left was just the flat top of Skaros Rock but the only way to get up there was a narrow steep climb that looked unappealing. Not so much going up, but coming down was what worried me. Some of the people coming down said it wasn’t worth it. we were getting practically the same view from where we were. So we decided to just skip it. After a few minutes of catching our breath, we started our trek back to the hotel. We grabbed a small bite of gyros and cider beer near the hotel and cooled off by the pool.

We had arranged for an evening catamaran tour that started at 3pm so we got changed and prepared for our next excursion. Everyone said that the evening catamaran tour was the best one because you got to experience that famous Santorini sunset on the water. So yes please and efcharisto! (That’s thank you in Greek… we’re learning a few tag lines)

We meet our driver right outside our hotel and 2 couples await us inside the car. In the far back seat, are a quiet Argentinian couple that are newly engaged. The couple in the middle seat are newlyweds from Australian that we had seen at our hotel pool. We quickly got to conversations about where in our travels we were and where we were headed. It was the Australians last night and were headed home the very next day. They’d been traveling for 3 weeks and had been all over Europe. The Argentinian couple had a similar stay as ours except a little backwards and were headed to Mykonos the next day. We gave them some tips and told them about stuff we had seen and what to expect. These couples were friendly and inviting to conversation so we could tell this boat trip was going to be fun and pleasant.

Our driver took us right to where Santo wines is but a little further in to the marina. Dozens of boats were getting ready to set sail for their evening tours. We waiting about 10 minutes by the little gift shop staying out of the blistering sun while the boat captains got the boat ready. Our driver even bought everyone ice cream while we waited. We walk up to a charming sail boat that was going to be sailed by 2 Greeks named Fakis and Gregory. Fakis had dark long dreadlocks and Gregory was short with blondish hair and they both of course had nice full beards. They quickly made us feel welcomed by cracking a few jokes and telling us the rules of the boat. Fakis encouraged the men to not try and be snipers and for them to sit to pee.

A few others joined us on the boat including 2 young men from Australia and 3 Persian young ladies from California. The 2 Australian guys made it clear they were here to party by taking their shorts off and exposing their brightly colored Budgy Smugglers (speedos).

Gregory immediately offered us alcoholic drinks and away we went. The ride out was a little choppy and one of the Cali girls got sick just a few minutes into it. Hearing that she got sick got me worried I’d get sick and I started to feel slightly queasy. I think it was all in my head. It didn’t help that the boat was practically sideways. It was a little scary. Those guys were good at sailing and were working their ass off making sure that boat was sailing. I only got scared for a few short moments. Once we got to our first swim/snorkel spot, Jarrett and I lathered up in sunscreen and got ready to jump in. The Australian guys were the first to jump in. Yep, it was cold!! The weather was warm so the cool water was appetizing. I gathered up the courage to jump from the side of the boat rather than to just step in from the back ladder. Jarrett immediately followed. It was so cold but our bodies got used to it quickly. Either that or our bodies just went numb. I’m gonna go with numb. The newlywed Australian couple took a liking to us and swam by us the whole time while talking about what we saw underneath in the water. A good 10-15 minutes or so of trying to snorkel with the goggles that were supplied I decided it was time for me to get back in the boat. As I dried off, I noticed the Argentinian couple talking and discussing something with Fakis. They had lost their GoPro in the water! I spoke to them in Spanish and asked what happened. The girl had said her fiancé had jumped in with the GoPro that was strapped “securely” onto his wrist, but thinks the impact of the water triggered the release button. They were sad and were coming to terms that they’d lost a valuable piece of equipment. Then Jarrett comes along and gets up to speed of what happened. He goes, “So do we need to go diving for a GoPro?” I told him knock himself out but their ain’t no way that thing is gonna show up again. Jarrett jumps in the water and attempts to look for it with some crappy goggles. I throw him some better snorkeling ones and he continues. I swear I looked away for 10 seconds and I hear some commotion. Jarrett had his arm straight up in the air in the water holding a GoPro. I had never been more proud of my new husband. I couldn’t believe it! Jarrett saved the day! The Argentinian lady and I hugged and jumped with excitement. Jarrett got nicknamed Poseidon, the god of the sea. 😂 The GoPro was still filming and Jarrett said he saw the lit screen glowing which made it easier to spot. We watched the video and laughed about how it filmed whole the rescue. The video was only 20 minutes long. Fakis, who has been doing this for 10 years, was in shock and couldn’t believe it. In all his years, no one had ever found their lost belongings in the Aegean sea. He told Jarrett and the Argentinan couple they should play the lottery.

We then took off to the next swim spot. Gregory served us fresh cherries and we listened to some music. We passed the Red Beach which gets its rust color from oxidation from the nearby volcano. Nearby was a nudist beach but it looked empty so nothing scandalous was seen. 🙈

We got to the black beach which obviously gets its color from the lava rocks from volcano. We were told if we swim to the shore to be super careful because the rocks cut like glass. All four Australians and the Argentinian woman swam out and explored. I stayed on the boat because I couldn’t bare to get in the cold water again. I just wanted to dry off and relax and soak in the last bit of sun. Jarrett didn’t bother getting in again either, I was a little surprised because he rarely passes up the opportunity to swim.

Here Gregory and Fakis started to get dinner ready. Gregory fired up the propane grill at the back of the boat and laid a dozen prawns to cook. The menu consisted of Greek salad, spaghetti with marinara sauce, chicken and rice, muscles with rice and the grilled prawns. One of the Australians mocked Americans by saying the famous Australian phrase, “Shrimp on the Barbie” but said that no one in Australia has ever said the word shrimp. There goes all the Australian language I know! 😉

After eating we headed out to a spot in the ocean to get the best view of the sunset. There were probably a couple dozen boats all around us doing the same thing. As sunset started, Fakis took everyone’s phone and started taking pictures for us. I thought that was so nice and a pleasant change from previous catamaran tours I’ve ever had in other countries. Usually they designate one of the workers to take pictures with their fancy camera and then charge you $40 for a copy of all the pictures they take. None of that nonsense here. Fakis even took a few selfies of him and other passengers of the boat on my phone. I’m glad he did because everyone on that boat was so nice and fun.

It was a fantastic group of people. We had all sorts of conversations during dinner. In particular, everyone was really curious what it was like in The States during the election of Trump. We were the only Americans that were involved in the conversation (the Cali girls just slightly paid attention and took selfies the whole time🙄🤳🏼) so we were answering all the questions. Turns out one of the Australian guys didn’t have an accent after all and I noticed it and said, “Hey! You’re not Australian!” He confirmed and said he was from Michigan. He’d been living in Australia for 2 years after visiting and never left. He’s a student there and never plans to return.

I definitely asked the Australians if their spiders and wild animals there were really as scary as the internet makes it out to be. They mostly confirmed that it’s safe, just as long as you keep your distance and don’t bother them (snakes and spiders). If they don’t feel attacked, they won’t attack you. I think I can visit there now. Here I come Elias! Get ready for us!

I most definitely got everyone’s Instagram and now follow them. It’s going to be fun seeing the rest of their journeys. The best kind of networking is travel networking. I plan on seeing the world so knowing people all over is helpful! One of the Australian guys gave us some tips for France. What to eat, what to say, and what not to say. Turns out I know a lot more French than I thought. Thanks half semester in 8th grade!

Santorini definitely has the best sunset I’d ever seen. Pictures don’t do it justice unfortunately. So you’re just gonna have to go and see it yourself. It’s worth it.

We later docked and found our driver and parted ways with half of the passengers. We hadn’t paid for our tour yet and everyone was wondering if we were ever gonna pay. The hotel that booked it for us said that we would pay when we get there. No one had yet said anything about it to us and we were curious if we even were going to pay at all. When we got to the spot where we were picked up, the driver pulled out his card reader. Darn! Almost got away Scott free! We swiped our cards and waved goodbye to the Argentinians left in the car. I’d been trying to speak so many languages and hearing all kinds of accents that “mucho gusto” came out of my mouth sounding more Texan than ever before. I hated myself for it. Jarrett was like “wow”.

We were exhausted at this point and were ready to get tucked into bed and get some sleep before our early flight the next morning. We opted out of a 5 hour ferry ride back to Athens and chose to do a 45 minute flight so we could have more time to sightsee. Since we were only in Athens for a short evening when we first arrived we didn’t get to see much. Our flight was at 8am so waking up early was going to be quite a change. We set 2 alarms just in case. Rachel had coordinated transportation to the airport already so we didn’t need to worry. It was picking us up at 5:55am. We made sure to pack that night so we didn’t need to rush in the morning.

The Santorini airport was small, maybe only 4 or 5 terminals. It was packed with people and hardly any sitting space. We found an empty terminal and sat for a few minutes before an airport worker made everyone clear it out for something. So we went and stood around in our terminal area until it was time for boarding. We didn’t get to have breakfast at the hotel because we left too early so we hoped to grab a snack at the airport but everything was so overpriced that we just waited until we got to Athens since it was such a short flight. The flight wasn’t even long enough for them to serve a snack or a drink. I practically blinked and we were ready for landing. I’ve been trying to write any time we are flying so since these last few flights have been short, I am currently in the Paris airport about to start our journey home finishing up this post about Santorini. Sorry y’all! I’m really exciting to write about our time France because it was super special and full of emotion. My next post will be about our one day in Athens though. Let’s just say it was almost as hot as Texas and I was ready to get it done and out of the way.