A Piece of Heaven AKA Santorini, Greece
After all this stress about whether or not we could go & figuring out the ferry tickets, we finally made it to Santorini! I had heard so many horror stories about the ferry and how people puke on it all the time and such, but it wasn’t bad at all. Actually it was quite comfy and I slept most of the 5 hours, or just watched the odd music videos they were showing. Once we arrived we had to figure out where we were going to stay. We wanted something cheap cause we were only going there to sleep. We walked into this tourist place that said free shuttle and booking hostels. They were great help. He found us multiple choices including this beach house that would have been just for us and SUPER cheap, but then we would have to pay for the shuttle to Oia and Fira (the two main places people associate Santorini with, where the pretty houses and fabulous view of the sunset is) so we decided to pay the slightly higher, but still super cheap hostel in a place in walking distance from Fira. The family we were with are the sweetest. It was family owned with the dad, who picked us up for free in the shuttle and when we tipped him he gave us hugs and pecks on the cheeks, the daughter, and the mom. They shoved 4 beds into a tiny room that we will all touching, but the room had wifi and air conditioning! It was fabulous! And we were in a residential area so it was nicer than the super loud hotels. We ventured out from there walking to Fira and seeing what it had to offer. It was beautiful and blue, matching the water!
We spent the day just walking around there and paying a man to sit on his donkey and take a picture. Bahahaha. Then we ran into some SASers from the field program to Santorini and we planned to meet up for dinner with them in Oia so we could see the sunset. Oia is known for their sunsets, even in the top 3 in the world for best sunsets. We made reservations at a roof top restaurant to view the sunset. It was yummy, but once the sun set we all froze from the wind! Bbuuurrrrr. After, we got back on the bus to our hostel to freshen up before going back out to Fira. We met a guy who is 22 named Aster or something along those lines.. it sounded like Asterisk *, but It was hard to hear him. He has been living in Greece for 20 years, so he showed us which club to go to and got us a free shot. Haha. Yolo. We all danced and had fun. Note to self: don’t drop it like it’s hot next to a bar or else you will hurt your hip. We got back to the room at about 4:30 am. And we woke up at 8am cause we wanted to get as much out of Santorini as possible in the amount of time we had. I’ve learned sleep is for losers. We got ready and walked around a little bit more and hit up a market so I could buy some cookies to munch upon later in my cabin. :) We then returned to the hostel and they brought us breakfast and then we left to catch the ferry. That being said we all slept on the ferry back. By the time we got back it was past 5 and we were all starving. We stopped at a cheap local café and got some gyros and Tzatziki with fries. Boy do I loveeee Greek food. SO GOOD. And that’s where I am now. Gotta get a good night sleep tonight cause I think we are planning on hiking up a mountain tomorrow early before it gets hot. Last day in Greece tomorrow and then Italy bound!
xoxo,
Em