The Only Toilet Available is 3,600 Years Old

---

I had booked the Archaeological Bus Tour for today, so after a Baklava breakfast (and today there was also tiramisu that was also bizarrely added to my breakfast selection) I left my wife and daughter for the day. They had already planned their day without me on the beach, by the pool and getting a massage each. It turned out that even the tour buses leave early yet, so luckily I've learned now and always get to bus stops at least 15 minutes before I need to. It was a small shuttle type bus to take us (there were three of us) to the main meeting point. We were dropped in the middle of nowhere with just an instruction to wait for Bus 19.

After three quarters of an hour and lots of other busses coming and going, most of which were also full of confused looking people, we decided to call the tour office to find if they had forgotten about us or not. It was that moment that the coach arrived having, apparently, been stuck in traffic.

The village we had been waiting in, Pyrgos, is the highest village in Santorini and used to be the capital until it was moved to Fira in the 1800s. If I'd have known I was going to have the time, I would have had a look round.

The first stop was the Prophet Elias Monastery, high up in the hills. We could actually see it from our hotel, but we thought it looked like some sort of military base, given what looks like a huge radar tower outside it. The actual monastery resembles some huge concrete monolith and is fenced off and derelict by the look of it.

The road was narrow and snaked up the hill. Once we got to the top, we left the driver doing a 103-point turn to get the coach ready to head back down. The guide took us to a pretty little Byzantine church, which is dedicated to the Prophet Elias and seems to be the main thing to see up there, along with the gift shop.

Apparently, there are so many saints and prophets that are celebrated by the Greeks, that there is literally something to celebrate every day of the year. I like their style. I wonder what we'll be celebrating this evening. I'll find out later (the Prophet Elias is celebrated on 20 July).

The driver had finished turning the bus when we got back and the next stop was the village of Megalochori. This is a beautiful village set in the hills and apparently has around 70 churches. There wasn't time to visit all of them so, we had a look round and got some photographs.

On the subject of churches, there are 600 or so on Santorini, although many are private. Once you start looking for them, they are everywhere you look, scattered all across the landscape.

We could have done with a bit more time in Megalochori, but I think they were trying to make up for the lost time earlier as we had a guided tour booked at the Akrotiri excavations and I expect that we need to get there at the right time.

That was next. Akrotiri is sometimes referred to as the Greek Pompeii, which, coincidentally, we visited a few weeks ago (see Mine is Huge and I'm Rich Enough to Flaunt It!). Well, given there were no Italians in our group, we were advised that, actually, Pompeii is the Italian Akrotiri.

The excavated ruins have all been covered within a modern building, presumably to protect them from the elements. I'm not sure why, as that wasn't necessary in Pompeii and, for some reason, all the paintings have frescos have been moved to a museum in Athens. We were shown pictures and they look amazing. I notes that they didn’t seem to have the penis obsession that the men of Pompeii did.

There also remains a lot that is still to be uncovered (95% according to the guide).

The guided tour was fascinating, although the guide was getting in a bit of bad mood with the guide who had taken us there, as she kept interjecting. But to be fair, she also needed to translate for some German people on the tour. The eruption that buried Akrotiri was the same one that created the caldera 3,600 years ago, way before Pompeii. It was the size of 40,000 atomic bombs and was the largest explosion in the last 10,000 years. There was evidence of debris having reached Greenland and Japan.

At Pompeii, there was evidence of the people who had been caught by the eruption, but here, there were no bodies and no valuables. It was apparent that everyone had evacuated beforehand (most likely due to earthquakes), but there is no record of what happened to them. The consensus seems to be that they would have, sadly, been killed by the tsunami wave caused by the eruption.

The guide pointed out a 3,600 old toilet in the ruins. Apparently, every house had one, so like Pompeii, their plumbing was well ahead of its time. That can't be said for modern Greek toilets as the toilets at the monastery and the modern ones here were both not working. Sadly, we weren't allowed to use the 3,600 old one, which probably was working.

From there it was a 10 minute walk and a scramble over some rocks to get to a view over the red beach. It's called the red beach, but the beach itself looked black to me and it was the rocks around it that were red, due to their iron content. The itinerary said that we would be stopping there for a swim. Not that I particularly wanted a swim, but were told to get some photos of the view and then get back to the bus, which had broken down whilst we were away and needed replacing.

It was 3.30pm and the end of the actual tour, but we then went to a restaurant for lunch, which was in Perissa by the church that I had walked to and, consequently, was not far from our hotel. I must admit I did feel it was all a bit rushed at each place up until the hour and a half that had been planned for lunch after the actual tour had finished. Thankfully, as it was walking distance from our hotel, I decided to skip lunch and head back to catch-up with my wife and daughter.

In the evening we went back to that Caribbean themed bar. After last time and with a strong fear of missing out, I also had a cocktail rather than my usual beer. This was in no way influenced by when we had previously watched them pouring the spirits and the measures looked generous to say the least. No precise measuring cups here.

It was then to a restaurant for our last authentic Greek meal. Souvlaki.

---

Photos

Random Church
A church in the pistachio fields, one of the 600 scattered across Santorini.

Byzantine Church
Outside the church dedicated to the Prophet Elias.

Byzantine Church
Inside the church dedicated to the Prophet Elias.

Prophet Elias Monastery
Closed and derelict.

Megalochori Church
One of the 70 in this former Santorini capital.

Ancient Market Square
It was before money, so goods were traded in the market place. The pots are originals.

3,600 Year Old Toilet
None of the modern ones seem to work.

Red Beach.
Although it's actually the rocks that are red.

Caribbean Cocktails
One with pineapple, one with Mango and one with banana.

Souvlaki
I’ve had the gyros, now it’s Souvlaki for my last Greek evening meal.