Santorini

mmm, how do you start writing about the most beautiful island on earth? it's a lot of pressure! Santorini was beautiful from the first moment we drove away from the port - up, up, up the mountains into the town of Fera. It's the Greece you see on postcards - those blue rooftops and whitewashed buildings built into the mountainside. Becky & I arrived on Saturday afternoon, did a quick drop off of bags at the hotel, and busted a move to the bus station where we hopped a bus to Oia ('eeea') for the afternoon and evening. We soon discovered that we had arrived during the HOTTEST part of the day (about 2 p.m.), and there is not one square inch of shade on the island. No matter, we wandered the winding streets, took innumerable photos, and drank in every possible view. There are so many beautiful things - really, everywhere you turn - a door, a gate, a little wall covered in creeping vines. It's the simplicity of the buildings (very simple lines and architecture) and the solo use of two colors (which by the way are the colors of the Greek flag) that makes everything else stand out. I still marvel at the flowers that could survive in such brilliant sunlight - Becky and I almost withered! We weren't sure we would make it to sunset, but what a good thing we ducked into a tiny bakery shop and scarfed down some snacks and sweet treats to hold us over.

The second day we public-transited ourselves to the ancient ruins of Thera. The island is prety compact, so it only took about 15 minutes to get there. We arrived at the ruins at 10:15 a.m. - already the sun was scorching hot, so we did a SUPER SPEEDY tour of the ruins. (I think this was the place where Becky made me give a fake tour-- and then we kept finding signs that told us exactly what each thing really was, and how misleading my tour was. not that my tour group of 1 really cared.) The view on top of Ancient Thera was wonderful, which we very much expected by day #2 in Santorini.

The rest of our time on Santorini was spent wandering the little town of Fera where we were staying (wait for it - our little guest house was called 'Villa Popi'). We stopped by Mama's restaurant (Mama is the aunt of our mainland friend Chris), and she made us some concoction of pasta with tomatos and feta, and all was right with the world.

Santorini is idyllic and timeless. I understand during tourist season, it is pretty much gridlocked (gross), but with good reason. My favorite moments were those hours of sunset, where the whole town was lit up in golden light. It's not possible to describe it fully- I guess you all just need to buy plane tickets and get over there!

I guess my other favorite thing was this Greek gentleman's courtship of Becky from his open window above where we were sitting. It was quite romantic- Apostolos, if you ever read this - you might just want to put out the cigarette next time.