The weather in the morning on Friday was finally good enough to utilize our terraces for breakfast. I made my typical bread/feta/oil/oregano combo, and we both had cereal. We also had orange juice and mini chocolate filled croissants. The terrace was comfy, and quiet, and had nice views of the sea.
Having missed the cutoff time for the ruins the day before, we headed down early to the bus depot. After the typical confusion at the bus station, we found the right bus and were on our way to Kamari. From the bus stop in Kamari, there are excursion mini-buses that take you up to the ruins of Ancient Thira. You can walk as well, but it's a very long and steep way up. The 10 euros for the mini-bus was well worth it. The mini-bus driver was very funny and it was always amusing when we passed tourists in rental cars on their way down. The road is more of a sidewalk in both construction and width, so you can imagine what passing is like. Luckily the cars and mini-buses are very small.
Ancient Thira is the number two attraction on the island, right behind Ancient Akrotiri, but Ancient Akrotiri has been closed for several years now following a fatal roof collapse in 2005. Ancient Thira dates from the 9th century B.C. with most buildings dating from the 4th century (B.C.). This is in contrast to the much older bronze age ruins at Ancient Akrotiri, the settlement that was abandoned and destroyed/preserved by the volcanic eruption between 1600-1500 B.C., the eruption that made the island the shape that it is today. Back to Ancient Thira... this location, at the very top of the hill at the south east part of the island, must have been a great defense point, along with having a fantastic view, but all we could think about is the 1+ hour hike up (or down) that the inhabitants must have had to get food and water. These folks must have been in top notch shape and been excellent hikers. The ruins themselves are much like many of the others we've seen. There is evidence of plumbing, always amazing, and the number of buildings is always amazing. There are some well preserved frescos even. The view from Ancient Thira is wonderful and at this point, we were very glad to have been delayed by a day in coming here, because we would have seen nothing but clouds and fog on the previous day. Today however, the visibility was great. We could see islands that we couldn't see on previous days. It was best day for weather so far.
We took the mini-bus down the mountain, saving us time and wear on our feet. At Kamira, there is a lovely black sand beach. Being a volcanic island, most of the beaches here are black sand. The black sand gets very hot in the sun. Again, we were glad to be here on such a nice day. Before heading to the beach, we tried to find one of the guidebook recommended lunch spots and we ended up at a place called Amalthia. At Amalthia, we got a nice Santorini salad and then ordered the mixed grill. The mixed grill, took forever and a half to make and when it arrived, we were greeted by way too much meat, just way too much, and most of it, not even that good. When we left, through a different entry, we saw the signs for the seafood grill, and another special, both of which appealed more to us, but weren't posted at the entrance we'd come through! Grrr.....
After lunch, we headed down to the beach. The water here was decent, temperature wise, but was quite rocky, hard on the feet, and not as clear as we'd found on Rhodes. Santorini isn't known for its beaches, but they are ok. The waves here were much stronger than the two beaches we'd been to on Rhodes. We found ourselves being tossed by big waves after going in only a little bit. It was pretty fun. Anyway, after getting out of the water, we dried off in the sun for a bit on our hotel-borrowed towels. And after drying off, we headed back to the bus station to catch the bus back to Fira, and then took another bus that heads to Oia and got off at the stop about 100 feet from our hotel in Firostephani.
After showering to get the ocean and ocean bits off of us, we took a late afternoon break and then got dressed for our fancy sunset dinner in Oia, where the sunsets are supposed to be the most spectacular, and this being the best day for visibility so far, we were extra excited to see it. We'd had our hotel make reservations for us at a nice place that they recommended. So we went out and caught the bus to Oia.
We arrived in Oia (pronounced "ee-uh") about an hour before our reservation and spent some time walking through it. Oia is most picturesque town on the island, and probably the most photographed, but it's not much different from Fira and Firostephani. At the point of the town/island, there's an old castle, and dozens of people, many with mountains of camera equipment were already setting up shop to watch
We went up to our restaurant, Kastro, a little before our reservation time, and sat down to look at the menu. This was our sunset dinner in place of a sunset dinner cruise that we didn't go for on account of the weather and wind. The food here was excellent, and the view even better. For dinner, we had an appetizer of stuffed olives, deep fried, so so good. Then a very good Greek salad, very nice. For the main dish, we were disappointed to not find any seafood on the menu (strange here on an island in the sea), so we ordered a beef steak, which was pretty good, but which I can do better. :) For dessert, we had baklava, very nice, very sweet, served warm with ice cream.
The sunset here was definitely amazing, and the crowds of people who turned up for it were at times overwhelming. A guy 30 feet away from us with a giant camera and giant tripod was taking about 30 shots (auto-fire) every 1-20 minutes. People come from all over the world to take pictures of this sunset. There were some boats down in the sea, and we could see them taking pictures of us (since we could see their flashes!).
After dinner, we headed back to the bus depot and waited (and waited) for the bus to finally come. I don't know if they were 20 minutes late, or if they'd changed the schedule again, but we did finally make it on the bus and made it back to our stop right by our hotel.
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