Santorini

Tuesday 4th August

We knew that Santorini would be the highlight of the cruise. I had been there before but David had only seen photos on the internet. Everyone had told him what a special place it is. We therefore actually set the alarm for 8am, hoping to be off the ship by 9:30. We didn’t make it. We stayed in bed for an extra 20 minutes and took our time.

Santorini is a tender port, which meant going to the Queen’s Room to get a ticket and waiting in line. We waited about 15 minutes, and almost missed our turn as David went back to the room to get my sunglasses! It was fortunate he did get them, as I had terrible trouble with my eyes all day. I worked out that my sunscreen lotion was trickling into my eyes along with my sweat and causing an irritation that made it difficult to keep my eyes open.

Santorini is a volcanic caldera. The white houses look spectacular on top of the stark volcanic layers.

We saw a very long queue on the dock and discovered it was for the cable car up the mountain. Luckily I had worked out an alternative way of getting to Oia. We walked along until we found the speed boats. There was a choice of a boat for €10 and one for €15. The more expensive one had a boat actually loading, and I hoped the service was better. The boat ride was lovely. However, there was little communication once we got off the boat. There was supposed to be a coach waiting to take us up the cliff. We ended up having to walk some distance uphill to find it! We could see other minivans backing down the hill with passengers, so we did not know what was going on. Eventually we were taken to Oia.

We wandered around, looking at all the lovely views as seen on postcards. 

We looked in the shops and David chose a bracelet for me to buy, rather like one I had seen on the Swarovski site. (The photos were taken later, back at the ship.)

Then, of course, we sat in a bar and drank wine and water with a lovely view over the sea and a sea breeze and free wifi. It was a lovely day.

Then came the horrendous part! I had hoped to take the speed boat back to the ship but was told that the port would not allow it. I wonder if it could have been arranged if we'd paid another €10 each? The last bus back to Thira was 2pm. We went back to the car park and waited. Eventually a bus came along and we lined up, only to be turned back at the door because it was with a different company! The driver called across ‘Hey Giorgio!Wait!’ to the driver of a mini van and we got aboard that. It was crowded. A man stood up to give me a seat but David had to stand for the  20-minute winding drive back.

We walked towards the cable car and found that the queue for it must have been around a kilometre long, and we later found that the wait for the cable car was about 2 hours. We could not see how we would catch it in time for our 4:30 last tender so we decided to walk down the steps, as did just about everyone else we spoke to from the ship. It was terrible. The steps are used by the donkeys, so were covered in donkey shit. The stones were slippery and I don’t think my sandals had a good enough grip. It was a long way down, worrying about each step. David managed better than I did. The description of it goes something like this:

Donkey shit, donkey shit, donkey shit, slide.

Move to the side to avoid a passing donkey.

Donkey shit, donkey shit, donkey shit, slide.

David moves to the side to wait for Diane.

I was exhausted by the time we got down, only to find a queue for the tender back to the ship! David stood in the queue while I sat in a café topping up with salt and water.

We decided not to dance that night. It was a party night with Nexus, the Cuban band. We enjoyed the music and chatted with some friends we’d made on board ship, Nikki, Chris and Julia. Afterwards, of course, we sat on the balcony and relaxed.