Blogs from Santorini, South Aegean, Greece, Europe - page 33

Santorini What an awesome break.... It was not exactly the typical week spent on a Greek island. We arrived on Halloween in the late afternoon. In Santorini, the tourist season winds down at the end of September. October is their shoulder season, and at Halloween the place basically shuts down for the winter. It took us a lot longer than usual to find ourselves a place to stay. We were harrased (as usual) when getting off the boat by the hotel touts, but we didn't get a good vibe from anyone. We eventually picked a guy in town who was a little more persistent than the rest. We followed him down a few alleys to a private house with the upstairs bedrooms converted to hotel rooms. The place was nothing special, but the price was incredible: ... read more

That was the fastest flight in the history of flights. Didn't have time to drink a glass of water. They served a chocolate filled croissant and a glass of water. My shoe had come untied before boarding the plane. I Didn't even have time to tie it on board. I have to tell you about Nic's blunder. She hastly packed her back pack for the flight and forgot her razor, jack knife and big bottle of water in it. Security only found the bottle but we still had to go back and check her backpack. Luckily we had time. We arrived in Santorini about 11 last night. That's about 3 in the afternoon for the rest of you. We got to our hotel which is more like an apartment. We will have to buy some food ... read more

Ohhh, Santorini!.....my favorite of the Greek Isles we visited. I could definitely hunker down here for a long while. Santorini, again, has most of the villages perched high up on the top of the cliff. It has seaside vineyards, a volcano,ancient ruins, great little restaurants. We only had enough time to do a fast run-through, so I definitely would love to return and explore it properly. We took a very modern, fast cable car to the top...and a very slow, smelly donkey back down to the port at the end of our visit (a decision I regretted the second I climbed on). Probably the longest 30 minutes of my life. The donkey trail zig-zagged straight down the cliff in a series of very steep stairs. The donkeys didn't appear to be paying an enourmous amount of ... read more

It was an early rise towards the port of Piraeus where we had to pick up our tickets at 6am and board the ship. We took our seats and eased back for our 5 hour journey to Santorini via Paros and Ios. When we arrived at Santorini new port we were welcomed by a scrum of taxi drivers with signs begging for a passenger- we swiftly paid to get out of the scrum and to our hotel located Imerovigili. On our way to our hotel the taxi driver surprised us by saying he had never heard of our apartments and began to call his taxi base for directions. As we made our way further and further away from the port- nobody seemed to know where this hotel was located! After a few more calls to the ... read more

What a difference between Athens and the islands! It is beautiful here! Joe and I slept late this morning (9:30am), which was good because it was the first night we slept past 6am, but bad because we almost missed our flight to Santorini. With a little luck and lots of running through the metro stations and airport, we made our 12:15 flight. The flight was about 50 minutes. Joe however, was not too happy on the small plane that we took. I reminded him that the other alternative to flying was a 9 hour boat trip. He relctantly agreed the flight was the lesser of two evils. All was worth it though when we finally landed, got our rental car (a Mercedes Smart car-which is WAY cute) and made it to our hotel. Our room sits ... read more