I first heard of Santorini when I googled "white buildings with blue roofs". I got that image in my mind, somehow, probably from postcards of the Mediterranean. Anyway I was determined to go there, to that somewhere where the skies are always blue and the walls are all white. It's like my vegas with less flash. Turns out that there are many other Greek islands too, but Santorini still topped the list when we made our choice.
The ferry ride was supposed to be 7 hours long but was more like 9 hours. We did it overnight, expecting to be sleeping in a proper seats. Alas, all the airline-like seats were occupied by the time we boarded, and we thought we had to sleep on the deck benches in open air. Real sketchy.
We ended up in the lounge, where kids were entertaining/irritating us with their antics. I swear I hate kids. I'd like them only if they don't run about or cry.
When I first laid my eyes on Fira, the main town, as I stood on top of a cliff, I just had to take a moment. The pictures don't even do it justice. The cliffs run straight down into the sea, with the streets and buildings perched haphazardly at the edge. Unfortunately, Santorini (like Mykonos, another pleasure paradise) is also heavily commercialized now. It's all restaurants and hotels. I'd like to visit the other islands for both rustic charm and completely white buildings.
Roofs are great places for creativity and self expression. Some guy put an entire boat up on his roof. In addition, we realized that the blue roofs are reserved for places of worship, so there aren't many of them. Also found the iconic three bell church, after a really long and hard search, but saw it from the other side of the bells.
Ever wondered how they keep the roofs in such pristine whiteness? We witnessed a guy repainting the roof.
The story goes that this island used to be a huge volcano which erupted and sank into the Aegean sea, leaving behind several islands and indirectly causing the collapse of the Minoan civilisation on Crete. I can't imagine a future eruption destroying everything there. So go visit if you can. The nightlife is good (though Mykonos is said to be wilder) but we retired early.
The caldera is understandably, one of the best places on earth to view a sunset. No spectacular clouds on that day, but it still BEAT the phuket beach and the grand canyon sunsets hands down.
As we were short of time, we could only visit a beach to hang around for a while. Couldn't tan or do anything else. The Perissa beach is covered with black sand, which gets literally quite hot in the afternoon. The blue green water is rather clear too.
I thought this restaurant had the best ambience. We didn't go in though.
Parting shot: Lights sparkling away in the night.
... It wasn't a wisdom tooth after all; it's a root canal thing and it's going to be EXPENSIVE. Enough to fly back to Singapore. In the immortal words of D'angelo, Shit Damn Motherfucker. On the other hand, my mum did the same thing 2 years ago and it cost her 750 or so. So.
