Sailing to Santorini

On a beautiful clear day, September 5, 2022, Jim, Shauna, Bob and I were tendered ashore to the Greek Isle of Santorini. Thinking we would outsmart the crowds and avoid standing in line to take the tram to the city, once we set foot in Fira port, we jumped aboard a small boat which took us around to the far side of Oia. Frankly, on approach to the island, it reminded me of some of the guano laden island peaks we had seen previously in places such as the Skellig Islands in Ireland. I know - so rude!

Upon reaching our destination, we hiked up a dirt road to town. It was not an impressive introduction to Oia. But we soon began to experience the charm of Santorini - and Gelato at Lolitas!

The first observation is that all of the houses are painted white. Why? There are 2 main reasons. The first one is that white color is a perfect reflector of the heat, helping locals preserve the coolness of their homes during the hot Greek summer. The second reason that reinforced this choice seems to be an outbreak of cholera in 1938. The government ordered the citizens to paint the buildings with limestone, a robust antibacterial material, to end the spread of the disease.

But the touches of additional colors is what really makes some of the buildings "pop".

And then there are the randomly colored structures which are sparsely spaced amid all the white.

The second thing that is noticed on Santorini, is just how many churches there are! I don't think I've ever seen so many crosses on top of buildings in such a compact area. Just look at what I've already shown.

No visit to Santorini would be complete without a search for the "5 blue domes" photograph.  While not perfect, I did manage to frame the shot with Bob and I in it.

Another thing I was on the hunt for were those illusive Greek Isle windmills. Are they not adorable?

My photo collection from Santorini wouldn't be complete with a few gorgeous views of the sea.

My final search at Santorini was for a souvenir charm for my collection. There was certainly no shortage of places to shop. And I did find an ancient Greek warrior helmet charm.

Our final challenge was going to be more difficult than presumed. This was the challenge of getting back onto our cruise ship. First of all, we had to figure out how to catch a bus back to the Fira tram. The ride was not very scenic. 

We disembarked the bus and walked up a road to a small town.

We found the tram entrance and soon realized that we were going to stand in line with about 10,000 passengers from 5 cruise ships in port that day. So, Bob and I choose to walk down the long steep and  slippery well-worn cobblestone pathway instead. We probably should have opted to ride a donkey.

When we finally reached the bottom and found the line for our tender boat, after waiting in line for some time, we were told that the sea was too rough and no tenders were able to navigate the choppy waves. We were hungry and with little choice of restaurants, we took a seat at the closest eatery where we could monitor the tender situation. As you can see by Bob's face, this was not a happy ending after a long day of touring. We were, however, slightly entertained (although really quite dismayed) by watching our ship's inept crew try to manage a very unruly and angry bunch of Israeli tourists. To their credit, they had been waiting in line for a tender for hours in the brutal sun with no relief in sight, when suddenly, a crew member stationed near the end of the line, just past our restaurant, announced that a tender had landed nearby. Bob and I had finished our meal and quickly joined the front of this new line. But we tried to remain calm as lots of over-heated and impatient passengers began shoving and pushing their way onto the tender. Several fights nearly broke out, but somehow, everyone eventually made it back onto the Rhapsody of the Seas.

I remember thinking that the Santorini which we saw didn't quite measure up to the gorgeous magazine images I had seen. I think this is because many of those photos are taken from vantage points we tourists didn't have access to. The walking path through town did not allow us to walk down into the residential areas, where we might have take some nice photos looking up the hillside. Or perhaps we needed some drone photos. Nevertheless, Santorini provided us with plenty of picturesque photos and fun memories.