Santorini, Greece

     We've finally arrived in Greece! Izzy has been waiting on this since we moved to Spain two years ago. And of course, it was a painful journey. Our flight was delayed, then the gate was changed due to the plane being changed. This made Iberia turn into a low cost airline and go the no seating rule route thus causing everyone to act like animals to get in line first. We watched a lot of verbal jousting between Spaniards and others who pretended they couldn't understand them. I guess the Spanish don't know the Greeks hate waiting in lines. The flight was rough and full of bratty four year old girls who threw temper tantrums the entire flight. Yay! When we landed, we found our bus to Piraeus, stacked our stuff in the seat next to us, and tried to take a nap. An Italian gentleman awoke us to ask us to move our stuff so he could use the seat while his girlfriend stood up during the hour ride holding their bags. We slept for four hours, woke up late, found our ship, and slept for a few hours on the top deck using a sleeping bag to shield us from the sun. But we made it to Santorini.

     We arrived to Santorini in the middle of the afternoon. The port is down on the south side of the island. As you exit, a bombardment of taxis, rental cars(one guy offered boobs with a car rental(not sure who would be providing them though)), and buses to service your every need. We elected the local bus to take us to Thira(pronounced Fira). We arrived and lugged the heavy bags up the hill for 20 minutes to our hotel. I think we sweated off two days worth of water along the way. We wanted to make today a beach day but all of the good beaches are on the south side of the island. Instead, we wandered around Thira.

     Thira sits north of the center of the island along the coast. Santorini and the surrounding islands are the remnants of a large volcanic eruption. If you look at the three islands from above, you can see how they were once connected. The water between them covered what used to be a volcanic crater. It collapsed into the sea after a large eruption that basically emptied the crater of all of its magma. Some scientists conjecture that this volcano not only killed and buried whatever civilization was present on the island, but also created a large tidal wave that wiped out the Minoans on Crete. There is a site here we hope to visit called Akrotiri. It houses the ruins of a Minoan outpost that was once on the island. Some of the city houses show that the people had two different water pipes, which means they were probably able to tap into the geothermal warm water around the volcano to use at home. Our visit is subject to it being open to the public.

     Our last important task of the day was to find delicious Greek food. There are many restaurants around Thira. We spent a lot of time eyeing up menus as we passed each place. One place in particular caught my eye because it advertised a view of the volcano and sunset. To boot, it served the two dishes we both wanted to eat; lamb and pasticio. We started off with grilled feta topped with a tomato and green pepper. The other two dishes were to die for. If you are ever in Santorini, be sure to pay a visit to Stani Taverna for a meal of traditional Greek food you won't soon forget. We can't wait for tomorrow!

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