Santorini, Sweetie

My trip to Greece - Santorini
(You better get comfortable to read this one...but it's so worth it)

On the ferry from Mykonos to Santorini, Dana and took only 2 of the assigned seats on our 3 seat row. While settling in for our 3 hour trip, I noticed a fairly attractive guy with olive skin, dark hair and eyes, and in our age range, standing in line at the snack bar. We kept making eye contact as I scanned the rest of the boat watching others take their seats, but didn't think much of it. About halfway through the trip, this same guy comes over to our empty seat and asks if anyone was sitting there. We told him no so he sat down. He said he missed the earlier ferry, so jumped on this one, but if you miss a ferry and catch the next, you aren't guaranteed a seat. He lucked out with this seat, or rather, we did. He immediately struck up a conversation with us, and we flirtingly teased him about him just "happening" to pick 2 pretty girls to sit next to. He asked us the typical first question of "where are you from?" Dana spouted out, "Atlanta, GA, USA." (We found out quickly that we had to define where we lived quite a bit more than if we were just visiting Boise. Telling people we were from Atlanta, and sometimes even, Atlanta, GA, summoned only blank stares. Tacking on USA at the end, always seemed to get more acknowledgement. Some people even referred to us being from Atlanta, New York. It's funny how some people have absolutely no concept or understanding of the different states in the US.) His mouth dropped open when he heard our answer. It turns out that he lives in Atlanta, too, and his family owns a popular late night diner called the Landmark Diner here. The irony is that I had just been to the Landmark Diner for a late night snack a few weekends prior to the trip after a night out with some friends! He was Greek American, going to Santorini to visit some family and friends, and his name was Costa (pronounced like Costa Rica). The chances of our paths crossing in the middle of Greece were serendipitous. And it only gets better. He asks us where we're staying on the island and we tell him that we're just winging our trip and haven't made any plans. As luck would have it, his cousin on the island owns a travel agency and a hotel a few blocks from the black volcanic sand beach called Perissa Beach! He made a call on our behalf and hooked us up with a room for 30 euro ($36) a night, at his cousin's hotel, Villa Holiday!! Off the ferry at Santorini, Costa introduced us to his cousins, Yannis and George, at their travel agency at the port. Yannis took us in his shuttle van to the hotel, and Costa and George said they'd meet up with us later that night for drinks at the hotel pool bar. Dana and I made out like champions, and we couldn't be more exited!

A little later that night, we met back up with George*, Yannis*, Costa*, and Yannis' fiance, Rita, aka pool bartender, at the hotel pool. We sat around and drank a few glasses of red wine (on the house even though we tried to insist that we pay) and talked for a little while. It was here where we learned our first, and most important, Greek word: Yamas. It means, "cheers", and it's customary to look the person you are toasting in the eye when you say this and clink their glass or you'll have bad sex for 10 years. Believe me, I stared everyone I toasted down! About a half hour later, Costa and George asked us to go to their friends' taverna for dinner. They drove us the few blocks down the street to their friend's place called The Best taverna, right on the beach. Costa, who's so much larger than life I can't even explain it, but the friendliest, most thoughtful guy, strolled in and went around telling everyone in the open air restaurant hello. We all sat down and Costa's friends Christos, the manager, and Nikos, a waiter, came over to meet us. Costa introduced us to all of his friends as the "sexy American girls." It still makes me smile, I mean, what girl would ever get tired of being introduced like that? Nikos right away apparently began to blush, and Costa called him out saying, "I know which girl Nikos likes!" I look at Nikos and look at Dana, unsure at first which one of us it is. When I look back at Nikos, he's turned some sort of embarrassed shade of purple and he's smiling at me. He shyly says in pretty good English with a surprising British accent, "you make me nervous, baby." It was cute, and I was flattered. We all ate dinner (I even tried a piece of octopus - it tasted like tuna fish) and drank another glass or two of wine. After dinner, George and Nikos offered to take Dana and I down the beach to a local bar called, The Beach Bar (really original names these places have, right?). Costa, on the other hand, had a date. We'd learn that Costa always had a date, which makes him even more of a funny character to me. So Dana and I go with George and Nikos. We had a great time, laughing and talking and drinking - it was so much fun! Nikos asked me to go see the beach with him under the full moon (which was right outside the bar), so I smile and go. We walk down and sit in the sand just above the water's edge washing up the beach and begin to kiss. I thought to myself, for a vacation fling, could it really get any better than a cute local boy, music from the bar, black volcanic sand, the Aegean Sea at my feet, and a full moon overhead? A little while later, Dana calls for me, so Nikos and I get up and walk over to the beach lounge chairs several yards away where she and George had been sitting and kissing. It's really late, so George takes us back to the hotel. In the hotel, Dana and I spend another hour or so giggling and rehashing the day before we finally go to sleep.

The next day we spent mostly down at the beach relaxing, enjoying the beautiful weather, and soaking in the sun. Costa was going to meet us that afternoon, but it seems he found another "date" so he said he'd catch up with us later. That night, Dana and I showered (again, no shower curtain and the bathroom was inevitably flooded) and walked back down to the beach to find a taverna to eat dinner. We went to a place called Meteora. The food wasn't that great, but the service was super friendly, the atmosphere was fun and upbeat, and the baklava for dessert came out with flair! Having a late night the night before, we headed back to the hotel, hung out at the pool with the boys for a little while after dinner and then turned in "early" (1:30am).

Wednesday we woke up and decided to travel around the island a bit. We walked up to the corner, where there happened to be another travel agency, and asked how to get to the winery for a wine tasting. The travel agent wrote down the bus stop we were supposed to get off at so we could give it to the bus driver to tell us when to get off. While at the travel agency, we also bought a ticket for an all-day sailboat tour for 18 euro ($22) that we'd take on Thursday to see the volcano, hot springs, small island on the other side of the volcano called Thirisia, and finally ending up at the city on the tip of the island called Oia (pronounced Eee-ah) for the sunset. With Thursday now planned, we hopped on the next bus and got off about 10 minutes later at Santo Winery. We walked up to the winery and saw some of the most breathtaking views of the volcano! The dogs at the winery really seemed to have the life! We went inside and ordered a wine sampling that consisted of 6 glasses of their different wines, bread, tomato paste, swiss cheese cubes, and olives - all for only 6.50 euro ($8)!! We took our wine samples back outside to take advantage of the scenery, where we really enjoyed ourselves and the gorgeous landscapes! Once finished at the winery, we went back to the bus stop to catch the bus into the central city, Fira (or Thira depending on who's saying/writing it), to walk around, shop, and watch the sunset across the volcano that Santorini is so famous for. After the sunset, we jumped on the bus back to the hotel and called Costa to see what they were up to. We made plans to meet up with Costa and Nikos at a local bar called Full Moon. There we had a few drinks, listened to some music (American music by the way, that's all we really heard in the realm of pop music. It's weird hearing 50cent and Gwen Stefani in Greece!), and had a pretty laid back night, meeting some guys from the Northwest Territory of Canada and another guy from Albania. I enjoyed meeting so many people from so many other countries that I don't typically meet people from (Albania, Poland, etc).

Thursday rolled around and it was time for our sailboat excursion (I have a ton of pictures from our excursion but unfortunately Flickr only allows you to upload so many picture in a month, and I've exceeded my limit already, so I'll have to add more pictures in November). We got down to the port and first took the boat out to the volcano. At the volcano, we climbed to the top, which turned out to be a challenge in and of itself. The travel agent didn't tell us we'd need to wear tennis shoes, so we have to climb to the top in flip flops! The trail up to the crater was a mix between soft lava sand and lava pebbles, so your feet sink in with every step, and pebbles roll in between your foot and your flip flop, making the trek a lot more difficult than it would initially appear. After a few pictures from the top of the volcano, the boat sounds the horn for us to come back. It's time for our next stop over at the volcanic hot springs on the other side of the volcano.

The boat sails over and pulls in as close as it can to the hot springs, but it's still a good 50 yards away from them! They tell everyone not to get off and swim over to the springs if you're not a good swimmer because it's quite a good distance away! I wasn't scared of swimming the distance, I was more nervous that I would have to jump off the boat into the deep, unknown water. I'm not a fan of swimming in water that deep, nor am I a fan of not being able to see what's lurking that far down. But, I had to suck it up and seize the moment, and I did. The hot springs are really just luke warm, but are created by the heat bubbling up from the volcano. There are many minerals in the water, including sulfur and iron, that turns the shallow springs from the typical beautiful blue into more of a ruddy red. Twenty minutes in the hot springs and the boat sounded the horn for our return again. We make the swim all the way back to the boat, the deeper water much, much, much colder than the springs, and climb back up the ladder, ready to go to our next stop, Thirisia, otherwise known to Dana, who loves food but you can't tell because she's so thin, as "lunch island."

This small island of Thirisia used to be part of the large island of Santorini until a massive earthquake in 1950 collapsed the bridge of land that connected the two and separated these masses of land forever. There are several restaurants right on the water there, so we hop off and find one to grab some lunch. While we're eating lunch, literally, the deck of the restaurant is in the water, I happen to notice a wave crash on the nearby rocky shore and see a baby octopus get washed up on shore! I jump up and run over with my camera to take some pictures. I've never seen an octopus alive and in the wild! It was so cool. While snapping the baby's picture, all of the sudden, the mama octopus shows up! That was even more amazing! What a rush! After lunch, Dana and I change out of our wet bathing suits just in time to catch the boat ready to take off for the city of Oia.

Oia (Eee-ah) was our favorite city by far. All have been beautiful, but Oia is not to be outdone! The sailboat dropped us off at port, where donkeys were lined up to take paying tourists up the steep, steep walkway up the cliff. That may have been the best 3 euro I spent all trip, especially after climbing up the volcano in flip flops! Oia is the quintessential Greece in my opinion. Albeit a slight bit touristy, it's where you find black cats sleeping in windows or against beautiful rustic doors. Cobblestone paths that weave in and amongst the locals' homes, shops, restaurants, and of course the famous blue-dome churches. Life seems so much simpler, more relaxed in Oia. As evening nears, the entire city of tourists gather in various places to watch the sun sink into its slumber. Once nature's show is over, it's time to load the bus back to Perissa Beach.

Back at the hotel, we went back out to the pool bar to have a few drinks with Yannis and Rita. Costa and Nikos stopped by for a few minutes, but they ended up going out for a night on the town in Fira while Dana and I stayed at the hotel getting Ouzo lessons from Yannis. Yannis' other cousin, Yannis (I'm not kidding - they said they have 10 people in their family and a parrot named Yannis), came over and hung out with us. We tried Ouzo in a shot. It tastes a little like black licorice, but it's not bad. We tried Ouzo with water (it turns from clear to cloudy when water is added), and that cuts the zing out of the alcohol, making it much easier going down. We tried Sambuca, which is a little different flavor than Ouzo. We tried some other kind of shots that Rita mixed up. It was so much fun! Yannis and Rita told us of their plans to get married in the spring, and we gave them our address so we could get an invitation to come back for the wedding!! With a nice, small buzz, Dana and I thanked them all and headed to bed after a very long, but very memorable day.

Our last day in Santorini and feeling a bit more confident and adventurous, Friday, we wanted to go to the nude beaches to lay out for a while. Not knowing exactly where they were to tell a taxi driver to take us, and Costa not being able to take us over there, we opted for staying locally at Perissa Beach and just laying out topless instead. That was wonderful! It felt so nice! Girls, if you can get over the modesty factor, I highly recommend it. Although, I'm sure we're on some creepy guy's camera phone, and now probably posted on the internet somewhere, because he was fooling around with his cell phone suspiciously very close to us. Three American guys (we later overheard were from San Francisco) came over and sat 2 beach chairs away from ours. Of all of the empty ones on the beach, they ended up picking those. I think they thought we were European as we overheard they're mumbled conversations. I'm sure it came as a big surprise to them when we started talking to each other in English, mentioning something about Atlanta! We ate a late lunch at Nikos' The Best taverna, and made plans to hang out with Nikos and George later that night for Nikos' birthday that was that day. During lunch, Nikos took his pen, grabbed my hand from across the table, flipped over to my palm, and drew a big heart on the palm of my hand with an arrow through it with the words, "Love, Nikos" written underneath. It was incredibly sweet. (I should mention here that in the 5 days we've been in Santorini, Nikos has become smitten. I think he's cute, but I'm nowhere near the point of a crush that he is. He keeps calling me his girlfriend and saying he wants to marry me and that he loves me. I can't figure out if he knows the implications of the words he's using in English, or if he's using them in a flirtatious way not realizing how strong of words those are in the English language. He'd say in his British accent, "I love you, baby, do you not love me?" To which my reply would be, "Oh, Nikos, of course I love spending time with you!" And his feelings would get hurt a little at my response.)

Friday night before heading down to the taverna for Nikos' birthday party, I went up to the tiny market up the street from us to find a birthday gift. I had asked him what he wanted, and he jokingly said a car. So I bought him a car magazine, a Fanta Orange (he, along with a good many other Greeks LOVE Fanta Orange), and some sort of a small Greek cake. We took that down to the taverna where we met up with Nikos and George, and spent a good portion of the night there eating, drinking, talking, and laughing. Nikos loved the gifts, or at least the thought behind the gifts, as he knew my shopping options were very limited. It was a good night, and a nice way to say goodbye as we were leaving on Saturday on the ferry for Athens. We exchanged numbers at his request, and that was the last I saw of Nikos. (although I've gotten, and still get, several text messages from him - now almost 2 weeks later - which is cute)

The next morning, our bags were packed, we checked out of the Villa Holiday, thanking Yannis and Rita. Yannis took us to port, and we were on a ferry back to Athens, much to our chagrin. I loved Santorini. It's a beautiful place.

*It wouldn't surprise me in the least to find out that George, Costa, and Yannis were in some sort of mafia or were some sort of drug smugglers, but we didn't ask any questions, and they were very hospitable!