Santorini

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Ok so it's been a while since I've written...I'm sorry!! So I guess I'll start with Santorini even though that was a week ago. Becca and I took a 9 hour ferry ride to Santorini which arrived at 2 in the morning. I was sooooo happy to get out of Athens, it's just too dirty. We didn't realize that the boat had docked almost until it was leaving, as they didn't make any announcement, so we were running frantically around the ship, otherwise it would have taken us to Rhodes. The people from the hostel picked us up and they were soooo nice. It really wasn't even a hostel that we stayed at, but a bed and breakfast which only cost 13.5 euros a night!! The island is definitely directed at tourists, as everything seems to be a hotel or restaurant, all of the tourists drive around the island on ATVs, so Becca and I rented two and explored. The island is beautiful. I never believed that the photos of the islands actually existed (haha I guess I thought they were photoshopped), until I got there. There are so many churches! Everywhere you turn you could see white churches with blue domes. The greeks are very religious (as many of us know), but I never knew to what extent because everyone has a picture of Mary and Jesus in their store. Everyone is incredibly friendly to the tourists as well. We spent the day exploring and decided to go to Perissa beach with our friends Madison and Erin. Perissa is quite possibly the most beautiful beach that I've ever been to. It's perfect, clean, black sand for several miles and everyone sits under little thatched umbrellas with chairs and go to the clubs and restaurants at night. I have to say, a 60 year old woman sitting next to me did take off her bikini top, which was a little disturbing because no one wants to see that : p. Santorini has 3 main beaches, a black sand beach, a white sand beach, and a red sand beach. We only visited the black and red sand beaches, because you had to take a small fishing boat to the white sand one. The red sand beach is incredible because it's surrounded by these towering red cliffs and everyone lays their towel in the shade of small caves in the cliffs. It's kind of on the gar side of the island though, and harder to get to, although the town surrounding it centers around the ruins of a venetian castle, which was really cool. We also traveled to the exact opposite side of the island to Oia to see the sunset which is supposed to be the most beautiful in the entire world. Unfortunately, the day we went it was not the most beautiful I've ever seen, but perhaps when we go back I'll see something incredible. Oia was definitely the favorite town in our group. It's very artsy with cute little shops and spectacular views. The buildings are literally hanging onto the sides of cliffs! So, I can't really remember any more for now......but I'll write it down if I do remember! Love

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