Greece-Tour-Santorini

Hi, it has been quite a long time since my last travel posting. I was busy preparing for my honeymoon trip. Our memorable journey started from 29 May to 12 June 2010.

To be frank, I was keeping my finger cross, hoping that there was no Greek riot occured during our trip. We took a local flight to KL followed by the Qatar Airway which transit at Doha before reaching Athens international airport. It was my first attempt to try the Qatar Airways as it offered the best rate. Surprisingly, the service was good and nothing much to complain about except that the area to rest our legs was a bit narrow. The view of Doha seemed to be a vast desert area with modern skyscrapper expanding within the desert itself. After about 2 hours in Doha airport, we flew to Athens. With several hours of flight, finally we reached Athens airport but the journey was not over yet as we had to take the domestic Aegean Air to Santorini which is famous for its majectic white wash buildings at the cliff of the island.

Finally, we reached Santorini at about 6.20pm. What a tiring journey after more than 20hours of flight and transit....The Santorini airport was pretty small and quiet probably due to off peak season. Luckily, I had made all the land, hotel and domestic flight arrangement through Aegean Thesaurus tour agent recommended by Matt Barrett, famous for his Greece travel guide. Throughout the trip, the arrangement was flawless. I could see the taxi transfer operator already waiting for us at the arrival hall. We passed by a beautiful Santorini landscape and unique building architecture before reaching the magnificient Oia white wash town. We made our check in at the office and dragged our luggage through several ascending and descending pathways and steps before reaching our VIP suite. Along the way, I managed to catch a glimpse of tourist waiting to view the spectacular sunset. It was a relief upon stepping into our suite. We had a great caldera view with superior cave like room. It was something that I look forward to stay, lazing around and just enjoying the sea view from our suite. Night was getting near. All I could think was to take a rejuvenating bath, dine in a restaurant nearby and had a good rest.

The next morning, fully charged up,we began to explore the Oia town. Oia is just like a fantasy town and you could see the white buildings flooding the cliff with a very unique architecture.



We had our first pleasant breakfast in the Blue Sky Restaurant. In general, a breakfast will cost about about 6 euros and dinner for about 12 to 15 euros. After that, we headed to a mini market shop to grab some groceries for home cooking since our suite came with a mini kitchen. This is one of the way to save $ while enjoying the local products. There are many dogs and cats along the way. It seemed that Santorini folks do treat animals in full respect.

This was my first cat encounter and she was well fed and clean. She likes to play around and I could hear her loud purr while the male was looking at us from a distance.

Hmmm..The male cat kept its cool while observing his companion playing around with us.

The day was great with clear sky, tranquil blue ocean and cool breeze. I enjoyed every single moment with my wife in this unique cave suite.

My suite was VIP suite no 3 located at the opened umbrella shade on top of the stairs. Personally, I liked this suite as it offerred some privacy, quiet, non-obstructive caldera view and just within minutes away from the sunset viewpoint. Like many other accommodations in Oia, it requires a person to walk several steep uneven steps to reach the suite. My only minor complain was that there was no phone in the suite and I had to go to the receptionist at the town centre for any request or complain.


These are the pictures taken in VIP suite no 3. I did quite a lot of research on the accommodation in Oia and this one came as one of the top in my list in terms of price and the desired tradisional cave like structure. I quite like the simplicity of the structure, curve ceiling and the blue and white color matching which gave us a very pleasant feeling. Not to mention that it can house for a family of four with the inner room having another queen size bed.


The balcony of VIP suite no 3 overlooking the stunning caldera view...

These were the groceries that we bought. If you have a chance to do some home cooking in Santorini, this place is famous for its olive oil and tomatoes while the bread is part of Greek typical supplimentary serving when you order a main course. The farm eggs that we bought had odd sizes. The giant one appeared to have two yolks.


Yum..yum. We had our first light lunch in Greece. I normally do not eat that many tomatoes but surprisingly, the tomatoes here had some sweetness element and was quite delicious.

In the evening, we strolled around the town towards the wind mill. It seemed like the windmill now had been converted into a rental accommodation for those who wants to experience staying in a windmill.



We had our dinner in Lotza restaurant. Although it was not located at the sunset view, it did offer another good caldera view. The Mythos and Amstel are the Greek local beers and as usual, we had some supplementary bread before our main course was served.


The following days were pretty the same activities ....lazing at our suite, did some home cooking and occasionally tried some of Oia restaurant, exploring the Oia and adjacent town, buying souvenirs, watching sunset and playing with cats and dogs.




One thing good about Oia town is the town itself is small and easy to move around without the disturbance of big vehicles. Do take note that this place does not have a map and you may get lost once a while. But it is not something to worry about as you can simply detour to some popular landmark and make your way back home easily.





I find that this place preserve its signature of unique architecture and white wash building pretty well. The locals seemed to have passion of maintaining this place and occasionally you can witness them painting their walls and even the steps.



It is a very romantic place for the couples and photographic heaven for photo enthusiast. Newly wed couples will find this place a perfect spot for their photo album.


Myself too, had some portrait shots in this island. I had a reddish face due to mild sunburn...
The doors and windows have their own styles and colour. The locals also liked to decorate their building using unique figurines and statues.






This red figurine above was the entrance to my VIP suite accommodation. The top portion looked like a half angel leaving the other portion resembling half animal.

Occasionally, there were some shop owners painted their shop with boastful colour to waylay tourist to visit them.




Many beautiful churches can be seen around this town and the most famous one is the blue dome church. Surprisingly, most of these churches are small, not like the neighbouring Western Europe cathedral. So far, the bigger ones were located in Fira.






Oia is famous for its sunset view and is among the top sunset viewing places in the world. Every evening you can see tourist gathering at the sunset view point to witness the spectacular sunset. Some of the tourist came from the cruise tour and some even travelled from the nearby town such as Fira.





For me, it was quite easy as I just need to climb up the steps from our suite to the main entrance and had a very short walk probably around 2 minutes to the sunset view point. There were frequent visitors such as the dogs as well as a guitar singer who usually sing the song ‘Here comes the Sun’ right before the sunset.



There were times when the sky was a bit cloudy that I just focused my attention to capture the atmosphere of the young and old loving couples enjoying the sunset. What a romantic scene....Hopefully, our marriage will be as loving and everlasting as these couples.




At dusk, most of the crowd left this popular sunset viewing spot. The scenery was spectacular even after the sun dissappeared. That was the magical time when the lights from the houses, shops, restaurants and hotels lit the entire Oia town.




Besides the cats encounter during the first day in Oia, I met many other cats and dogs along the way. Among them, the most memorable one was a dog named ‘Misea’ which we eventually named our robotic vacuum cleaner as ‘Misea’.

He is a very intelligent dog which had followed and guided us to one of the swimming spot in Ammoudi and always kept an eye on us by looking back several times to ensure he is not far away from our sights. We got to know his name from his name tag and is very likable by many. It has its playful charm and I had never seen a dog that likes to play with reflections projected from watches or some reflective items onto the shadow.

On the other hand, there was a female cat that I remembered quite well but not in a good way though. My wife called this female cat as my 2nd wife as she liked to flirt around and at times, tried to jump into our suite and scared my wife while she was fast asleep. From the photo, it looks cuddly and gentle, but not in actual case.Anyway, towards the last 1 or 2 days before our departure to Athens, it started to behave well. Below were some other cats and dogs encounter when I was in this island.






Throughout the whole week in Santorini, the restaurants that I visited were pretty good with most of them offering a good unobstructive scenic view and romantic environment.Some delicacies that I enjoyed most in Oia were the tomato Keftedes (fried tomatoes) and the Moussaka. My wife enjoyed the local Greek Feta cheese salad and fried cheese. The lemon pie was delicious as well.








On some of the days, we had our home cooked meal. The pasta coupled with Greek wine were simply delicious and we get to enjoy our own private balcony overlooking the tranquil deep blue caldera ocean view.


On one of the occasion, we descended about a hundred to two hundred steps to the nearby Ammoudi port for a swim and had a nice fresh seafood lunch in one of the recommended Katina restaurant.

Along the way, I saw some donkeys and horses carrying bags of sand, coming towards our decending pathway to the nearby workers for wall patching work.


Misea, the dog followed and guided us to a swimming spot but I ended up dipping my legs into the seawater as it was chilly in the spring season. We had some grilled prawns and a snapper for lunch. The Katina restaurant workers were very friendly and helpful.

This old man was probably the owner of the Katina restaurant. He was painting the restaurant chairs and at times, resting to enjoy the beautiful ocean view.

Here comes the fresh catch from the sea. The father and son seemed to have good bonding between them. Wishing them a happy simple life...

Some tour boats that can be seen at the Ammoudi port.


Unlike other boats, I spotted this tiny boat which seemed to be some sort of Greek tradisional boat.

It was worth going to Ammoudi port to experience a different angle of Oia from the bottom of the cliff. Not to mentioned too that I felt in love with the crystal clear sea water and the simple quiet surroundings.

Another popular spot in Santorini is the Fira town. Getting to this town took us about half an hour from the Oia bus station through a winding road.


Fira town is a more happening place with many restaurants, souvenir shops and pubs flooding around the town. Personally, I prefer the quieter and tranquil place in Oia than the more commercialized Fira town.



But, this town has its own charm to attract travellers that come in groups and looking for social activities. Many restaurants were built right at the cliff to provide non obstructive caldera view to the tourist while enjoying the meal.


At the bottom of the cliff is the port where the ferries from other islands dock and there are two ways to get to the Fira town either by the cable car or opt for a donkey ride for those who are more adventurist.



Opposite the cliff is Nea Kameni, a small volcanic origin that attracted tourist to experience the black lava excursion along the crater, a whiff of sulfur and to view the Santorini island from different perspective. I did not take the tour, therefore, nothing to comment about this place.


I visited two churches in Fira. They are bigger than those in Oia. The internal architecture and wall paintings were remarkable.




I saw this intriguing figuring not far from the church. He looked as if he is enjoying the caldera view just like what we did.

Venus, the goddess figurine of love, beauty and fertility.

The souvenirs in either Fira or Oia were simply amazing. How I wish I had extra empty space in my luggage to store all these souvenirs. There were so many souvenirs to choose from such as the wall decorative items, towels, postcards, mug, soft toys etc.






We met a very friendly souvenir shop owner in Oia. During his younger days, he used to be a ship captain and had travelled to many countries around the globe. The name of the shop is Summer Love and do pay a visit to his shop. You can easily spot the shop from the sunset view point.


Overall, I personally feel that spending about a week in Oia with a glimpse of Fira town were just perfect. I did not have to rush through the days to explore the town and enjoy the surroundings. The temperature was moderate around 20-23C and easy to move around as it was not at the peak season(just beginning). It is one of the memorable places that I had visited.

Next destination is to Delphi...to be continue...

Pictures
http://picasaweb.google.com/photo.dannylim/Santorini#