{"id":14685,"date":"2019-07-15T08:57:18","date_gmt":"2019-07-15T14:57:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/?p=14685"},"modified":"2019-07-15T09:06:00","modified_gmt":"2019-07-15T15:06:00","slug":"vacation-2019-part-two-santorini","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2019\/07\/vacation-2019-part-two-santorini.html","title":{"rendered":"Vacation 2019, part two: Santorini"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Continuing with my vacation narrative:<\/p>\n

Day 4:\u00a0 the start of the cruise.<\/span><\/p>\n

We took our time in the morning, with breakfast and general lazing around until it was checkout time, because the earliest arrival on the cruise ship was 12:30.\u00a0 We then hauled our suitcases back to the train station, took a train to the port, and cast about for a way to get from the port train station to the cruise ship terminal itself; we had figured we could take a taxi for the remainder of the trip, but we saw the city bus headed to the port, bought tickets at the vendor at the train station, and were\u00a0 on our way to the port (though that took a further shuttle bus, too).<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, one thing that we didn\u2019t expect was the complicated process to embark; first, security lines; then, check-in similar to an airport; then, dropping off luggage; then boarding, finding our stateroom, and having lunch and exploring the ship.\u00a0 Annoyingly, my husband and I each had our hiking boots on (due to scant space in luggage) and had to clomp around in them for much of the afternoon while waiting for the suitcases to arrive.\u00a0 But we were pleasantly surprised that even though the cruise departure was 5 pm, everything had already \u201cstarted\u201d when we arrived, including lunch.<\/span><\/p>\n

Day 5:\u00a0 sea day.<\/span><\/p>\n

I said in my prior post<\/a> that I found the sea days\/sea time a bit humdrum.\u00a0 We slept in, explored the ship, napped, watched a movie in the stateroom, played cards in the card room, went to the pool (the only time \u2013 it was hot and shadeless), and watched the night\u2019s show \u2013 and ate.<\/span><\/p>\n

Day 6: Santorini.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the story with Santorini:<\/span><\/p>\n

you know that postcard perfect image of white houses set atop a cliff with blue domes on the churches?<\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s Santorini.<\/span><\/p>\n

Except that\u2019s not where you dock.\u00a0 In fact, you don\u2019t dock at all; you tender, and the tenders (boats more or less the size of what you\u2019d take a boat tour along the Chicago River in) dock at a considerably less-interesting town, Fira.\u00a0 Sure, you could pay a big chunk of change to have the cruise line bring you to your final destination, but that was too rich for my blood.\u00a0 Instead, what I read (and reread, because I kept looking into this) is that it\u2019s a multi-step process to get to postcard-perfect Oia:\u00a0 first you have to take a cable car (watch for the lines!) up from Fira Port to Fira Town, or, alternatively, hike up the \u201cdonkey trail\u201d alongside the donkeys and their droppings, itself a 30 \u2013 45 hike.\u00a0 Then you find a taxi or the public bus to get yourself to Oia and back.\u00a0 Oh, and on top of that, the warnings were incessant:\u00a0 the small capacity of the cable car makes for lines as long as 2 hours in the high season.\u00a0 I had also read that there existed a ferry-boat option directly from the port but then kept reading conflicting answers on whether it still existed, with the conclusion of one travel forum poster being, \u201ceh, all you can really do is go there and see if there are signs for it or not.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

So as it happens, they announced the distribution of the tender tickets would be at 10:00 that morning, since the boat arrived at noon.\u00a0 And the further instructions were, \u201cafter the first couple hours, there will be an announcement of \u201copen tender\u201d and you won\u2019t need a ticket any longer \u2014 which spooked me because I did not want to have to sit around with a high tender boat number for some unknown length of time.\u00a0 So, starting at 9:00, first my husband, then I stood in line, and we were in tender boat #5.\u00a0 What\u2019s more, the boat actually moored a bit early, so our tender actually left a hair after noon.\u00a0 And when we got close to the port we could see billboards for two competing \u201cspeedboat to Oia companies\u201d and for EUR 15 (free for children) we were on our way \u2014 though even so it required a bus from the Oia port to the town itself, but then the tour company that ran the service had buses returning back to Fira every hour.\u00a0 We soaked in the atmosphere, ate lunch (we\u2019d had a late breakfast) at a place with a view of the sea and prices that seemed reasonable so far as we could tell, soaked in more atmosphere, found that postcard view, and took the 4:00 bus back to Fira (the \u201chighlight\u201d of which was when the bus crossed paths with another headed the opposite direction \u2014 in the one direction was so little room between the buses that it was a marvel they didn\u2019t scrape mirrors, and in the other was virtually no room before a drop-off to the cliff below).<\/span><\/p>\n

And, yes, there as a lot of atmosphere to be soaked in.\u00a0 This was a former fishing town; my understanding is that it\u2019s now pretty much wholly given over to tourism.\u00a0 There were signs everywhere saying \u201cwelcome tourists, please respect our home\u201d and the periodic \u201ctourists, go home,\u201d but, well, I would be surprised if there was particularly much remaining fishing or other non-tourist industry (I should look this up).\u00a0 I did also read along the way that they\u2019re not too pleased with the cruise ship tourists who come in for a day, and at best buy something from a souvenir shop and may or may not even eat a meal; they\u2019d much rather have tourists who stay longer, and, heck, it would have been nice to have had a longer visit but so be it.\u00a0 The town was also apparently rather destroyed after a 1956 earthquake, then rebuilt, and it\u2019s not like a medieval town that exudes antiquity, but the white-painted plaster was clearly practical due to the heat (you could simply tell the different in touching such a surface vs. another color).<\/span><\/p>\n

So far, so good.\u00a0 Exactly what I was hoping for.\u00a0 But then \u2014 boom!\u00a0 the heat got to me.\u00a0 We made our way back from the bus stop to the center of the town (or, at least the endless number of souvenir shops, from which my son bought a little something), and then I said, \u201cI need to sit down; the heat is really getting to me.\u201d\u00a0 I paid EUR 3 not for a cone of gelato but an ice cream novelty no different than what you\u2019d find in the US, because I was looking for something to recharge me, and then we got onto the cable car and headed back to the boat far earlier than I had anticipated.\u00a0 (On the plus side, there were no lines at all at the cable car, presumably both because most people were staying on the island longer since the departure time was 10 pm, and because there was only our ship in port that day.)<\/span><\/p>\n

And then I felt stomachache-ey at dinner, and went back to the room to lay down and missed the performer that my son subsequently declared his favorite, a crooner who sang Ed Sheeran and Phantom of the Opera and the like.\u00a0 So, bleh, but it was still a nice day.<\/span><\/p>\n

At any rate, here are some Santorini pictures.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Approaching Santorini (with the tender boat)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"
Another view, with the cable car and the \u201cdonkey trail\u201d<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

(Yeah, this last one could stand to be cropped.)<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

All images own work.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continuing with my vacation narrative: Day 4:\u00a0 the start of the cruise. We took our time in the morning, with breakfast and general lazing around until it was checkout time, because the earliest arrival on the cruise ship was 12:30.\u00a0 We then hauled our suitcases back to the train station, took a train to the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2209,"featured_media":14610,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1272],"class_list":["post-14685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-vacation-2019"],"yoast_head":"\nVacation 2019, part two: Santorini<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Continuing with my vacation narrative: Day 4:\u00a0 the start of the cruise. 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