The Not So Brilliant Colors of Santorini

We had high hopes for Santorini, the only island we were staying on this trip. Everyone’s seen the iconic photo of the Oia sunset, and for some reason we thought, you know, it was just an everyday thing.

Nope. There is a reason why tourist seasons exist. It’s the time of the year where the weather is beautiful and the gods are in good moods and your probability of seeing a beautiful sunset is high. Alas, we were not there during tourist season, which spared us of this:

But also meant we didn’t get to see this:

Santorini is part of the Cyclades islands, a group of 2,200 islands encircling Delos, the supposed birth place of Apollo and Artemis. According to ancient myth, one of the daughters of Triton was impregnated by the Argonaut Euphemus on his return journey from Troy (in her sleep of course), and needed to hide from her angry father. The deadbeat dad was instructed (again, in his sleep) to throw some dirt into the ocean, and miraculously an island appeared. The half god son was born there and named Theras, which gave the island its original name, Thera.

The weather wasn’t too terrible when we arrived. Since our time is short, I decided to sign up for a day tour that started with a hike up to the volcano. I kinda missed the part of the description that said wear sturdy shoes, and those volcanic pebbles sure did a number through my thin soles.

After the hike, we got back on the boat (did I mention this tour was on a boat?) and sailed to to the other side of the island. Somewhere in the middle of the ocean, the boat stopped and the captain was like, jump in the water and go that way! I was a bit confused, but apparently there was a hot spring near by where you can enjoy swimming in warm water. Some people took the plunge, I forgot to bring a swimsuit (I really was not prepped for all the action on this tour). It turned out to be a good thing, since the people who went for the swim came back and said they never got to a part of the water that could be remotely called warm. I imagine during the high tourist season of summer, this would have been a good stop though!

The next stop on the tour was Thirassia, a smaller island that detached from Santorini during a volcanic eruption around 1600 BC. When we got off at the port, we were told to just go up the steps and explore the island ourselves. The steps that looked like this:

I looked at my cute shoes not made for hiking and once again lamented not reading the description of the tour. But c’est la vie, I’ll just think of it as a really long and painful foot massage.

The island is home to less than 300 people, and doesn’t have much tourism presence except for the remnants of what seemed to be a failed restaurant venture.

I guess that’s what people come here for, the peace and quietude of a traditional Greek village.

While we saw very few people around, there were definitely plenty of cats roaming the streets:

For a brief moment we saw the sun, and the gentle breeze swept across the water, creating an endless ripple that calmed the mind.

And then it was down the same steps. In my same crappy shoes. Thankfully it was time to get back on the boat and head towards Oia, and we got a gorgeous view of the town from our boat:

Back on Oia, the animals you’ll see roaming around are not cats, but donkeys! You’ll see them go up and down the steps like they know where they are going (for the most part they carry tourists who don’t want to walk up and down the hundreds of winding steps), but sometimes they’ll just hang out in the middle of the road and you’ll have to push them to the side in order to pass.

You have a choice of taking a gondola from the port to the town, but I highly suggest taking the walk at least once, if only to stop for a few seconds to enjoy this beautiful view, which I imagine would be even more gorgeous on a nice sunny day:

Like any worthy tourist town, there are plenty of shops to stroll through if you are tired of looking at the pretty buildings or while you are waiting for the sunset. I personally stayed away from them, knowing that whatever “I must have” trinket would just end up collecting dust as soon as the magic of being on the road wears off.

So I headed for the cliffs, where a few others were already waiting for the sunset:

Unfortunately the gods were lazy and no one came to blow away the thick clouds. The sun was no where to be found and this was the best I can do:

Some times you end a journey with a little bit of regret. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever left a place feeling like I’ve done everything there is to do, seen everything there is to see. Perhaps one day I’ll make it back to Santorini, and finally see that gorgeous sunset from the postcards.