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Saturday November 24th, 2012: Santorini, Greece
Bob: We left the ship on one of the first tenders and landed at the foot of the bluff that leads up to Fira, the main city on Santorini. The three ways up or down that cliff are walking (cheap but steep!), riding a donkey (5 Euro, but smelly!), or taking a fairly new and very nice cable car system (4 Euro, fast, quiet, clean, smooth). Not surprisingly, we opted for the latter. |
Monika: After two days at seas, we were ready for some walking. We had not booked a tour for Santorini, but planned to do a walk from Fira, the capital city at the top of the cliff, to Oia the town at the very northern end of the island. We had been told that it would be a 10km walk and would take about three hours since we had to walk across or around two volcanoes. Well it sounded like just the thing to do for two Volksmarch enthusiasts like us. We were up early and watched as our ship steamed into the caldera that was at the shores of the island. The top of the mountains looked like they had snow on them, but that was only the white-washed houses on top of the cliffs. We walked onto one of the first tenders without waiting. At the bottom of the cliffs we had three ways to get up to Fira, walk up the steps (600 of them), ride on a donkey, or take a cable car. We opted for the cable car, and again there was no waiting, since we were the only cruise ship in town. |
Bob: Curling around directly underneath the station on top of the bluff, we headed North along the cliff-top trail to Oia, the northernmost point on the island. Although the trail was supposedly only 10 kilometers and 3 hours, we ended up walking for 3 hours and 45 minutes to get to the center of Oia, and I personally felt it was somewhat more than 10 kilometers! But the views along the way were astonishing and well worth the effort. |
Monika: So by 8:45 we were on our way to Oia. The port lecturer who had walked this before had told us to always stay to the ocean side. So for the first two miles we walked through Fira. Looking back ever now and then, we had some spectacular views and stopped often for pictures. At one point there was a truck blocking the street completely and we had to walk on the seawall to get past it. |
Bob: Part of the reason we were so slow was a rough, rocky trail. On one stretch we walked over and around some volcanic cones, and there the surface became downright treacherous. Smooth volcanic pebbles covered the rocky surface of the trail, which made it a bit like trying to walk on marbles! The cones were not that high, just a few hundred feet, but coming down the far side was wickedly slippery and Monika slipped and fell, but no harm done. We were walking with Jim and Susan, who also had difficulties with the footing, so it wasn't just us. At one point I also slid off toward the edge of the cliff and was just able to stop myself by sticking my left leg staight out--only later did I realize that I had hyper-extended the knee joint and strained it rather badly, an injury that took a long time to heal completely. |
Monika: We finally got to the northern edge of Fira. Then we walked over and around two small volcanoes between Fira and Oia. By this time a couple from the tender, Susan and Jim, had caught up to us, and we we stayed together for the rest of the walk. Following the port lecturer we stayed to the sea side of the volcano. There is still a debate whether we should have taken a supposed path to the road side. No matter, this path got us around the mountain. However, walking down to the road turned out to be treacherous, since the surface was very slippery crumbled lava. I was the first one going down on my backside. But the others kept slip sliding around too. |
Bob: We had a choice of paths either over or around those volcanic cones, and we chose an old cart track leading up to a small white cottage, hoping for a better trail. But the "road" was severely eroded in many places and composed of similar loose volcanic rock, so we didn't gain much--next time I'll try to take a different route. We chose the path directly over the second, taller volcanic cone, and at the top we paused for pictures. The town of Oia was gleaming in the sunlight down at end of the peninsula below us, and the other small islands were nestled just offshore across the flooded floor of the old caldera, a very unique and pretty sight. As we descended we found an old church on the shoulder of the hill, but it was of course locked up tight. Still, it looked like it was still regularly used as the trail down the hill from that church was basically paved with larger flagstones or volcanic rocks. We marvelled at how much time and effort making that trail up the side of the hill to the church must have taken, but it certainly was pleasant after the rather dicey trail conditions in the middle of our walk. |
Monika: But finally we reached the road. For about 100 to 200 yeards, we had to walk along the road, where buses and cars zipped by us. But finally we reached another path, the went to the next volcano, two tops with a saddle between. We reached the saddle and did not really know which way to go. There was no really well marked path so we kept following a rather wide track up the larger mountain. It ended at a house. From there it was goat trail all the way which did lead us to the top of the mountain. Maybe, there was an easier path around the mountain, but there was a certain satisfaction in having reached the top of the mountain. Of course, we took pictures and were happy to see Oia down below. Going downhill on this mountain was not as bad, the different type of lava made it not nearly as slippery as the first one. We walked past two little chapels and finally reached the outskirts of Oia a little after 12PM. It had been all of 3 hours and then some and we weren't even in Oia proper. But it had been a heck of an adventure. |
Bob: Once past an apparent rubbish dump, the trail into the town of Oia became broad and well-paved, probably to accomodate strolling tourists. We took our time and took a LOT of pictures as the town of Oia has houses marching up the side of the cliff in pure, startling white sprinkled with a variety of light pastel hues. Very pretty! Sprinkled in between the houses were the Greek orthodox churches, some of which had quite distinctive brilliant blue domes. They usually also boasted a separate bell tower, with old brass bells showing a green patina of age. Rather tired by that point, we stopped for an authentic Greek meal at one of the open restaurants (many were already closed for the season as we were the penultimate ship to be in port). We enjoyed resting, eating, and chatting with Jim and Susan. |
Monika: The little town of Oia was just a tourist town, like Fira. We started to meet our fellow ship mates who had come by bus and planned to walk back to Fira. One guy had on flip-flops in bare feet. Looking back at the trek, we strongly discouraged him from trying the walk, but we don't know what ultimately happened. There was one tourist street next to the ocean. We all were hungry by now and starting looking for a place that would sell Gyros. But no luck. The "fast food" places were closed. But some tourist shops were open and we did look at some of them. The town itself was pretty, with little churches everywhere. We kept asking for Gyro places without success and finally ended up in a little restaurant. It may not have had Gyros, but the spinach pie I had and the Moussaka Bob had seemed to be authentic Greek as was the beer, Mythos, that Jim and I had. Altogether a very pleasant meal, and it felt good to sit down for a while. |
Bob: After lunch we four continued on out the the very end of the trail where we found a couple of old windmills of a distinctive type with thin poles braced with wires to support the sails. |
Monika: But then we were up again. After all we had gotten this far, so now, we needed to get to the very northern point of the island, where there were supposed to be a windmill. We did find it and took the requisite pictures. After that we went over to a view point on the seaside, where we had a view of the famous three churches with the blue roofs. of course, another picture taking opportunity. |
Bob: But finally we returned to the Oia bus station to catch the last bus back to Fira, which left promptly at 4 p.m. The ride lasted exactly 20 minutes and was interesting in itself because we were treated to views of the other side of the island, which is fairly flat with terraces given over to vineyards, pistachio trees, and other forms of agriculture as well as the houses where the real inhabitants of Santorini typically live--we were informed that during most of the year, mainly tourists live in the houses in Fira and Oia. Once back in Fira we split up because I wanted to find some more earings for Monika, and she ultimately found studs in both opal and fresh water pearls, plus a small dangling pair with a design worked in metal. We were fairly weary at that point and dusk was coming on, so we took the tram down to the dock and the next tender back to the ship, getting to dinner a bit late. Fortunately Corry had waited for us, so we had a nice dinner talking with her and then just kind of fell into bed and read as long as we could keep our eyes open, which wasn't too long! |
Monika: So now that we had seen the sights of Oia, we headed for the bus back to Fira. None of us was ready to walk back, besides it was well after 3PM and the last tender would leave at 6:30. To our great surprise, the 3:50 bus, was the last one for the day. I am glad we had not planned on a later one! While we were waiting, Bob went back up the street to buy some local pistacchio nuts. The bus came as expected and left around 4, dropping us off at the cathedral in Fira around 4:20. I had wanted some more earstuds, so we went "shoppen" (German: Einkaufen gehen). In the first store I found some fresh water pearls that would go well with my pearl necklace. Later on we found a set with opals and one with a little dangling design. Now I was happy and we headed back down the cliff using the cable car (too tired for the stairs) and onto the tender. We got back to our stateroom by about 5:25 and just had enought time to clean up a little and head for dinner. But after that, I took a nice long hot shower to loosen my muscles and the headed to bed. |
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