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Published: June 28th 2008
In order to leave Santorini and get to Ios, we had to get ourselves back down to the port. Lucky for us, George, or Mike if you prefer real names, arranges this for you. Unlucky for us, it wasn't George who would be driving us, but his brother. We'll call him, George II. So George II shows up and doesn't seem particularly happy to be driving us and two other people to the port on this particular day. We get into his little van, and about... mmmm..... 20 seconds into the drive I see how this is going to go. This is going to be one of those times where your life flashes in front of your eyes, about every.. ten seconds. We're weaving in and out of traffic on the narrow "city" streets. Pedestrians really have a free for all here, and I'm sure we just about hit every other one. Grandmas, children, even the poor donkey that was tied to the post, he didn't really care who he almost clipped. He put the pedal to the metal and let the feta cheese fly. Eventually we made it to the hill. The port is at the bottom of a hill, or more specifically a mountain. So like most mountain roads this is a narrow winding one, with rocky cliffs that jet out onto the road. Also, should you drive off said road you would likely plummet to your painful and untimely death as your car rolled, hoping only that your giant green backpack would hit you in the head and knock you unconscious before you knew what was going on. George II, however, is fearless. George II things it's awesome to go as fast as he can on this road. Passing people? That's okay. Crashing into the rocky mountain wall? That's okay. Turning tight corners but never slowing down and consequently almost smashing into a large gravel truck? That's more than okay. George II thinks this is NASCAR and he is going for the gold medal. George II was not given the memo that everything in Greece is late and/or slow. We actually stop speaking. I am, obviously, writing about this rather lightly now, but it was probably one of the scariest parts of my trip. We couldn't even really laugh it off. At first we were saying stuff like "DISNEYLAND", which what Jono and I started saying when things got bumpy or went fast or there was a lot of turbulence on a plane, but we went from "Disneyland" to "Hindenburg" in a few minutes.
Eventually we rolled into the port, attempted to say thank you to George II and ran away from him and his van. We were rather early for our ferry, and had to spend a lot of time waiting around. Normally, this would have been okay but they also happen to be repaving the port with gravel and tar. So it smelled, and some how made the temperature rise a few degrees. Because of the construction the nice sitting station (which I actually never saw) was closed so we had no choice but to wait outside in the fresh tar air. Later we saw George at the port and wondered why he didn't drive us there himself.
Lucky for us we had booked a slow ferry this time. These are similar to the ones from Vancouver to Victoria. Big, sturdy, place to stand outside and most importantly NOT THE FLYINGCAT 4! We were all happy to be on it, especially Jessi. These are the boats of poor people (costing us only 7 euros) but they do take twice as long. It took us about four hours to get to Ios, but i didn't mind. It was a beautiful ride. I look lots of pictures of Santorini, from the exact angle I always wanted to see it from. Jessi and Jono slept the whole way, I couldn't sleep for whatever reason, so i spent most of the time enjoying the view and just resting.
When we got to Ios, again we were being picked up by the guy running our hostel/hotel/villa. It was called the Skala, and the owner and our host, was a hilarious man who knew everyone in the town and was very friendly. I also don't remember his name, it was a complicated Greek one. We never named this man I realized now. So we'll call him... Guelph Ontario. So Guelph Ontario takes us to our room, and tells us where to go. The hotel is on the of one of the many hills/mountains on the island, leaving us with a perfect view of the only real town on the place. There are only about 1500 people who live there. Our room was small, but clean, and sadly I had to share a bed with Jessi. I'm just greatful I didn't get bugs. From Jessi. Not from the hotel. The shower actually had a curtain on it. This was a miracle. On top of our rooms, was a beautiful pool and bar, and there was even a little restaurant there. From the pool though there was a spectacular view of the town, and we spent much time gazing out at sunsets. Even though I obviously hate sunsets. I mean I didn't take 10 million pictures of sunsets or anything. The day wasn't as warm as many, so we spent much of it by the pool, and sort had a little bit of "alone" time for ourselves. Keeping our threesome dynamic healthy I think!
Guelph Ontario also owns a local restaurant in Ios and as guests of his fine establishment we got a small discount if we ate there. So we did and the food was AMAZING. We had lots of things we hadn't tried yet and it was really great. The following night we wandered around the small town for a long time and didn't find any restaurant that appealed to us, but a guy on the street convinced us to go into his. That was a bad decision, it was the worst food we had in all of Greece. We wished we had followed our gut and gone back to see Guelph Ontario and eat some of his delicious vegetarian Mousaka.
The next day we went and rented a car so we could explore the island. The only place we could find that had an automatic did not like us. Or more specifically did not like Jono. We're sure he over charged us and kept reminding us not to drive too fast. He didn't trust us at all. We paid about 20 euros more for that car than the one in Santorini, and we didn't really feel all that safe in it. What did it have that was important to us? A CD player. So we blasted our Britney and Nickleback and and began to explore the tiny island. There are not a lot of people who live here, and once we left the main town we hardly saw another car or person. The islands are a semi-arid climate, so although they are islands, they don't really have the same tropical feel as Hawaii. We drove up and down the very mountainous place, staring down at the beautiful blue ocean, occasionally running into goats, it sort of had a dry desert feeling to it. Ios really does feel like the middle of no where once you leave the main town. We eventually made our way to Homer's tomb, which was on a beautiful hill over looking the water. The tomb itself was really amazing, and to think how long ago it was built and that those stones still stayed in place was pretty spectacular. If you like that kind of thing. That my friends was our culture for the day, and one of only two cultural outings really made on the islands. After that we decided to.. hit up the beach!
It wasn't the warmest day, and was quite windy, but being the brave Canadian souls that we are we thought we could take it. I mean it's not like 25C is cold. Right? So we took our stock of gummy bears, pita chips, fanta (for Jono) and apples and drove around until we came across a deserted beach. For about 2 hours, the three of us had an entire beach to ourselves. It was amazing. If you like that kind of thing. Until at one point we were taking a self photo of ourselves using my timer, when something hit me in the head. I thought it was Jono doing something weird (because he was high on too much fanta), but i turn and there was a giant husky dog jumping on us. I may have yelled for the saint of Guelph Ontario to save me! Anyway after a while we coxed the dog back to his owner and had the beach back to ourselves. Later got back in the car and stopped at a restaurant we passed along the way, and had local olives and local cheese. Again, over looking the ocean. Which was.. you know.. okay... if you like kind of thing. Which obviously I don't.
More driving, more Britney, another BEAUTIFUL beach (this time with some beautiful boys on it), and water so clear you could see the bottom through at least 12 feet of water, and then back to the hotel for a shower and eventually dinner. That night, I wasn't feeling well, so i didn't really partake in the drinking, so Jessi and Jono did the honours. I mean Jessi doesn't really like drinking, and doesn't do it much, so she was really nice and drank my share. Eventually, we snuck up to our pool and did a little late night swimming, before we were kicked out. We were loud because Jessi was being creepy. We ended up spending a couple of hours wrapped in a blanket, laying out under the stars just outside our room. The stars are amazing. These are the stars of myths, philosophy, democracy.... They are the stars of culture and theatre. Which I mean, is okay, if you like that kind of thing.
The next morning Guelph Ontario drove us down to the port, and we were headed back to Santorini on another slow ferry. Jessi slept while Jono and I talked with a guy from Brazil for a while, and enjoyed the ocean air. Going back to Santorini was really exciting because we love it there so much we were happy to go back. At the same time, it also felt like our trip was starting to wind down... which was incredibly sad. So in our typical fashion we ignored this possibility and headed back to Santorini for more domaldes, more wine, more Britney.. and Jono's birthday.
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nicknack
Nicky
rough life
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